Q: I was sad to see Logan Sargeant get sacked but I do understand it. He had just not progressed as a driver and with Franco Colapinto scoring in just his second race, the switch makes sense. My question is, why are American drivers not succeeding? Both Sargeant and Jak Crawford have come up through the European ladder system, have been competitive and won in the junior series, but yet show no sign of being able to compete in F1. What are we missing? Our last F1 winner was Mario Andretti 50 years ago.
Mark B. Floral City, FL
CM: Personally, I think it’s just the sheer numbers of those trying to make it to F1 that is the issue, and I totally understand why they are low. Lots of talent would love to become F1 drivers, but the only really viable route is through the junior categories of F3 and F2 in Europe.
The facts do speak for themselves — the Baku podium, for example, had three F2 champions on it (Oscar Piastri, 2021, Charles Leclerc, 2017 and George Russell, 2018), while fourth-placed Lando Norris was runner-up in 2018.
With the way Super License points are handed out, and the experience drivers get on F1 tracks, plus being able to get signed by young driver programs and work with the teams, it all asks for a massive commitment at an extremely young age. Many of the young drivers are even identified in karting, and the European scene is where many get spotted, because there’s no guarantee an American racing karts in the U.S. will want or be able to move to Europe for the step up to cars.
So when you only have one or two American drivers at a time racing in F3, then that number is only likely to go down in F2, and then you’ve got such a small sample size who might get to F1.
American drivers clearly have easily enough potential, but finding a way of making that pathway into F3 and F2 more viable for more of them is what would increase the talent pool a that level, and then you’re more likely to get a future F1 winner standing out.
Q: Do F1 cars have cooling fans? They seem to sit for a long time on the grid while awaiting the last row to settle in position. What are the various engineering roles for all those folks up on the pit wall?
John Ehrhart
CM: Nope, there are no cooling fans on cars. That’s why you see team members pointing hand-held ones at them on the grid and in the garage. Teams design permanent fans that they can clip into the car’s airbox and sidepods when they need to as well, but that’s only for when it’s in the garage or on the grid for half an hour pre-race. (Williams actually put the airbox fan in during a quick turnaround in Q3 in Baku and in the rush forgot to take it out, so Alex Albon had to stop in the pit exit and throw it out of his cockpit!)
The radiators and brake ducts just work with airflow, so drivers are balancing trying to get enough heat into some parts of the car before the start of the race (like the tires and brakes) so that they don’t cool down too much on the grid, but also keeping engine temps down before sitting there.
But the engines are pretty robust now when idling, and we often see them waiting at the end of the pit lane for far longer before sessions start. Cylinders can be cut and certain engine modes activated to keep temperatures down when sat still.
You get a different mix of roles for teams, but the general setup includes the team principal, chief strategy engineer, the race engineers of each car, and the trackside head of engineering (who oversees both cars on that front).
Q: How many miles does the pace car cover during the course of a season?
Nitro Bob, Boston
KELLY CRANDALL: The best way to answer this is to understand that it’s up to the OEM what happens with the pace car. You’ll notice that each track had an OEM partner and that dictates what type of vehicle is used and provided by the OEM. So, it would be more of a question to them about how they handle the usage of their vehicles. NASCAR only requires information about caution lights and car coloring, and the event management team works with the OEM to go through that process.
Q: With respect to the engine detonation in John Force’s Funny Car, I was wondering if it’s possible to design some sort of a carbon fiber shroud that could be installed and in place over the engine prior to the run? Is it possible that a shroud could contain the detonated engine and prevent harm to the driver?
Jerry, Houston
KC: It’s such a hard thing to fully protect from happening when these drivers are essentially driving ticking time bombs. But I know that NHRA is constantly looking for ways to improve safety and Force’s crash is another incident that gives them plenty to evaluate going forward. In the case of your question, the Funny Car bodies currently have front firewalls that are layered in titanium, aluminum and carbon fiber. And carbon fiber is not 100% fireproof. From what I’ve been told, there is a burst panel that is built into body above the blower that is meant to help with the pressure during an explosion. Again, in any form of racing driver safety is going to be a continued process and sometimes it’ll be reactive when something big happens. I think we’ll continued to see changes down the road in response to the Force crash.
THE FINAL WORD
From Robin Miller’s Mailbag, September 18, 2013
Q: Based on the Michael Waltrip Racing NASCAR fix at Richmond, what is the worst IndyCar fix that you have witnessed? Before the 1996 Indy 500 during a very private team meeting, I heard one new co-owner of a team who had multiple cars entered was discussing a plan to bring out a yellow by one of his backmarkers when the primary drivers made an early last pit.
By causing a yellow while a very early last pit stop was made, they were figuring that would gain a significant advantage. I was appalled at this guy’s plan and was glad that it never materialized. This was the same guy who had spent time in jail for insider trading. And I’m glad that he was not around IndyCar very long.
Scott Thompson
ROBIN MILLER: To say a race has ever been fixed is impossible because of all the dynamics and cars. Clint Bowyer’s intentional spin only brought out the caution and slowed Ryan Newman’s apparent victory, which he then lost in the pits. Bryan Herta’s “spin” at Sonoma in 2006 enabled teammate Marco Andretti to have enough fuel to finish, but he still had to win the race. I know George Bignotti ran Johnny Parsons out of fuel on purpose in 1977 to try and help Gordon Johncock with a caution, and Mario once asked if Michael “needed a yellow,” so this kind of gamesmanship isn’t new. But Bowyer’s move set off a chain reaction that decided a race and The Chase.