Thursday, October 25, 2012

ATTACKING THE INDIAN GRAND PRIX

The Indian Grand Prix is on this weekend at the Buddh International Circuit in Greater Noida near New Delhi, India. As with all grand prix races, the right preparation can decide where you end up on Sunday evening. Even with all the practice and testing and forecasting on Friday and even qualifying on Saturday, the strategy plays an important part in any race.

The Buddh International Circuit proved popular with drivers last season on its inaugural event. It is the second fastest race track on the calendar after Monza, with an average lap speed of 145mph.

But it’s a tricky one on strategy. Last year the harder tyre was too slow relative to the softer one so the strategies were quite skewed. This year the teams will hope to play it like they did in Japan, favouring two stints on the hard tyre, but there is a possibility that one stop might turn out to be the way to go. As the teams have so little data to work with from last year and with different tyres this year, the free practice sessions will be vital in finding the best way to attack the race.

James Allen has his usual race strategy analysis mapped out to fantastic detail here. In it he outlines all the information needed to understand how the race will unfold and what are the considerations. Also, if you would like to test out your own strategy, how you think the race should be handled from a team's point of view, see if your strategy has any merit with the UBS Race Strategy Calculator here. Here you will find a step by step guide to the major considerations when planning a race strategy, such as the tyre choice and the amount of time it takes to make a stop.


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