WSR Round 3: Monaco

[WSR Fan]

Right, as it's the biggest race of the WSR calendar this weekend in Monaco, I thought it deserved it's very own thread.

Here's a quick reminder of the race result from 2006:

1. Maldonado (Draco) 36m 37.286s
2. Rossiter (Pons) +14.836
3. Franchi (Prema) +30.210
4. Fleming (Carlin) +35.919
5. Shimoda (Victory) +37.350
6. Parente (Victory) +37.978
7. Kerr (KTR) +39.085
8. Kostka (Draco) +40.030
9. Pavlovic (Cram) +44.589
10. Soucek (Interwetten.com) +53.341

11. McIntosh (KTR) +53.871
12. d'Ambrosio (Tech 1) +54.685
13. Pilet (GD Racing) +59.243
14. Jouanny (RC Motorsport) +1 Lap
15. Aleshin (Carlin) +1 Lap
16. Kane (Epsilon Euskadi) +1 Lap
17. Fukuda (Tech 1) +1 Lap
18. Meneghello (GD Racing) +1 Lap
19. Bonetti (Jenzer) +1 Lap
20. Salignon (Interwetten.com) +3 Laps

Ret. Hanley (Cram) 16 Laps
Ret. Danielsson (Comtec) 14 Laps
Ret. Barba (Jenzer) 12 Laps
Ret. Montanari (Prema) 6 Laps
Ret. Van Lagen (Comtec) 1 Lap
Ret. Miguez (Pons) 1 Lap
DNQ. Toccacelo (Eurointernational)
DNQ. Valsecchi (Epsilon Euskadi)
DNQ. Garcia (RC Motorsport)
DNQ. Bennani (Eurointernational)

With GP2, the Porsche Supercup and, of course, Formula One also on the bill, the track action is rather limited for WSR, with the cars getting a maximum of just 1 hour, 10 minutes running before Sunday's race (Note: The below times are local times)

Thursday 24th May:

08:30 - 09:15 - Collective Testing

Saturday 26th May:

09:00 - 09:25 - Qualifying (Group A)
09:25 - 09:50 - Qualifying (Group B)

Sunday 27th May:

11:15 - Race (25 Laps)


At the moment, Thursday's weather is forecast to be fine, but there is a 60% chance of rain on both Saturday and Sunday. Add this to the fact that 18 of this year's drivers are series rookies and, AFAIK, only 14 of them have driven at Monaco before, and we could potentially be in for a wacky race

[WSR Fan]

Also, I don't know if anyone else has seen this yet, but you can now bet on WSR races over at http://www.interwetten.com. I don't normally bet that often, but as it's Monaco I gave into temptation and put a small wager on Alvaro Parente for the win (at the reasonably good odds of 7/1). With his up-turn in form at the Nurburgring, Ben Hanley looks good value at 9/1, as does home town favourite Clivio Piccione, who is 24/1.

[WSR Fan]

Thursday Free Practice:

1 - Ben Hanley - Prema - 1'28"408 - 19 Laps
2 - Alvaro Parente - Tech 1 - 1'29"056 - 22
3 - Davide Valsecchi - Epsilon - 1'29"061 - 22
4 - Celso Miguez - Eurointernational - 1'29"124 - 21
5 - Milos Pavlovic - Draco - 1'29"191 - 20
6 - Sebastian Vettel - Carlin - 1'29"201 - 20
7 - Alvaro Barba - Draco - 1'29"280 - 23
8 - Salvador Duran - Interwetten - 1'29"378 - 20
9 - Carlos Iaconelli - Pons - 1'29"416 - 18
10 - Marco Bonanomi - RC - 1'29"443 - 20
11 - Guillaume Moreau - KTR - 1'29"888 - 24
12 - Giedo Van der Garde - Victory - 1'30"076 - 23
13 - Alejandro Nunez - Comtec - 1'30"188 - 22
14 - Clivio Piccione - RC - 1'30"479 - 12
15 - Bertrand Baguette - KTR - 1'30"514 - 23
16 - Julien Jousse - Tech 1 - 1'30"639 - 23
17 - Alessandro Ciompi - Eurointernational - 1'30"909 - 22
18 - Mikhail Aleshin - Carlin - 1'30"966 - 11
19 - Xavier Maassen - Prema - 1'31"291 - 23
20 - Miguel Molina - Pons - 1'31"357 - 24
21 - Fairuz Fauzy - Cram - 1'31"460 - 11
22 - James Walker - Fortec - 1'31"714 - 21
23 - Charlie Kimball - Victory - 1'31"736 - 23
24 - Daniil Move - Interwetten - 1'32"657 - 18
25 - Pasquale Di Sabatino - GD - 1'33"138 - 18
26 - Michael Herck - Comtec - 1'33"329 - 18
27 - Pippa Mann - Cram - 1'34"690 - 16
28 - Ricardo Risatti - GD - 1'36"337 - 5
29 - Filipe Albuquerque - Epsilon - 1'40"952 - 4
30 - Richard Philippe - Fortec - 1'43"000 - 4

I also noticed this quote from the press release:

Among the other newcomers, Julien Jousse (Tech 1 Racing) and Michael Herck (Red Devil Comtec) both managed to complete their maximum allowed laps without making any mistakes.

Since when did they have a limit to the amount of laps drivers can do in Free Practice? Or is it just a Monaco-specific rule?

[gomick]

impressive times from ben hanley - he has had a great start to 2007 in different racing categories

[runshaw]

Why are the WS times so far off GP2? I know they can lap in 1 min 25 secs but GP2 can do 1 min 20 secs. I know they aren't as quick generally, but at a circuit like Monaco I thought they would only be a couple of seconds slower than GP2 cars? Couple of years back GP2 had an extra soft tyre to make sure their cars were much quicker than WS cars, are they still doing that? F3 cars can lap in 1 min 28secs bracket, I just would have thought the times would be closer to GP2.

[gomick]

fastest qualifying times around the streets of monaco - shall be intersting to see how the 2007 times stack up in gp2 & wsr

FIA Formula 1 2006 Fernando Alonso 1:13.962
FIA GP2 2006 Lewis Hamilton 1:20.430
(WSR) Formula Renault V6 2006 Christian Montanari 1:25.397
FIA Formula 3 Euro Series 2005 Lewis Hamilton 1:28.593

[hotwheels]

Originally Posted by gomick

fastest qualifying times around the streets of monaco - shall be intersting to see how the 2007 times stack up in gp2 & wsr

FIA Formula 1 2006 Fernando Alonso 1:13.962
FIA GP2 2006 Lewis Hamilton 1:20.430
(WSR) Formula Renault V6 2006 Christian Montanari 1:25.397
FIA Formula 3 Euro Series 2005 Lewis Hamilton 1:28.593

very good info, indeed. Do Ws cars have special "big" wings for MOnaco, as Gp2 ones?

[Jackman]

GP2 has the same wings, tyres and everything else at Monaco as they have all year.

[hotwheels]

sorry, Jack, but the wings are definitely different. They,ve been testing on larger wings earlier this year in Paul Ricard and AFAIK they were designed only for Monaco.

[WSR Fan]

Sorry to nit-pick gomick, but Montanari's Pole time in 2006 was slightly faster at 1:25.390.

Interestingly, Maldonado's GP2 Pole time today was 0.390s slower than Hamilton's effort from 2006, despite the cars' aero having been improved slightly. It would be nice if the WSR cars could close the gap a little and just maybe sneek into the high 1:24s.

On the subject of Qualifying, with the 26-car limit at Monaco four drivers will fail to qualify, but who do you think they will be? It's a hard one to call, but based on early season form I'm going with Mann, Maassen, di Sabatino and Philippe. Although having said that, Garcia, Toccacelo and Valsecchi all missed the cut last year so we could get a surprise DNQ or two.

[dave not neil]

Big wings on a street circuit?

Never usally happens really, the corners are generally all slow, so the aero doesn't work.

Red Bull were plauged last year by there car creating so much drag, yet they go to Monaco and stick it on the podium, because the areo doesnt affect as much.

[Obizzz]

Originally Posted by WSR Fan

On the subject of Qualifying, with the 26-car limit at Monaco four drivers will fail to qualify, but who do you think they will be? It's a hard one to call, but based on early season form I'm going with Mann, Maassen, di Sabatino and Philippe. Although having said that, Garcia, Toccacelo and Valsecchi all missed the cut last year so we could get a surprise DNQ or two.

Mann gets some coaching to avoid that... http://www.pippamann.com/NewsArticle.aspx?ArticleID=71

[P3ndula]

She didn't make the cut and neither did Daniil Move, Michael Herck and Xavier Maassen.

[Jackman]

Originally Posted by hotwheels

sorry, Jack, but the wings are definitely different. They,ve been testing on larger wings earlier this year in Paul Ricard and AFAIK they were designed only for Monaco.

I'm writing this from the GP2 paddock - I can tell you categorically that they're the same wings as usual.

[Sev]

Originally Posted by Jackman

I'm writing this from the GP2 paddock - I can tell you categorically that they're the same wings as usual.

Not to want to derail the thread, but - How come you are in the GP2 paddock? Visiting, or do you have some involvement?

[Jackman]

I work here.

[jackaroo]

Dave you answered your own comment. Drag has less influence therefore you can carry more wing ( and drag ). Higher wings will work at lower speeds. Ie Red Bull had more downforce which worked at Monaco!!

[dave not neil]

Originally Posted by jackaroo

Dave you answered your own comment. Drag has less influence therefore you can carry more wing ( and drag ). Higher wings will work at lower speeds. Ie Red Bull had more downforce which worked at Monaco!!

Its not that they had more downforce, they had the aerodynamics of a brick, The cars never go fast enough around a street circuit for the aero to be a major factor its the mechanical grip that counts.

Take f3 at pau last year, Dallara do a 'high downforce' wing kit, yet every team ran standard 'medium downforce' on a track that is tighter and twistier than Monaco, and for Macau, everyone ran 'low downforce' kits.

[Martin Haven]

[QUOTE=dave not neil]The cars never go fast enough around a street circuit for the aero to be a major factor its the mechanical grip that counts.QUOTE]

Maybe that's part of the difference then - certainly, Bridgestone's softest slick was used for the GP2 race in Monaco but tha cars have always displayed good mechanical grip, particularly evident in slow corners - when was the last time you saw F1 cars wheel-to-wheel round Tosa, for example?

Throw in a squidge of power and that may be enough to squeeze out the gap

[Russfeld]

And F1 cars are always sporting odd wing setups around Monaco, of course the download works.

[runshaw]

Duran just got pole then crashed at St Devote

[WSR Fan]

Now that is a tasty grid. For the first real time this season all the perceived front runners are in the Top 10, which also features 9 different teams. Parente has definitely had the edge over Vettel so far this weekend and hopefully it will stay that way tomorrow (as I said at the beginning of the thread, I've got a bet on Parente for the win!).

And just like F1 and GP2, the WSR pole time was also slower than last year (by 0.425s).

[WSR Fan]

Originally Posted by WSR Fan

Parente has definitely had the edge over Vettel so far this weekend and hopefully it will stay that way tomorrow (as I said at the beginning of the thread, I've got a bet on Parente for the win!).

Woo

BTW, ItaliaRacing have mistakenly put Parente on 49 points instead of 51. I know there is still a long way to go this season, but with such a big gap back to third I think we're set for a Parente/Vettel title battle, which I have to say is an awesome prospect!

Also, Kimball and Nunez aren't on the results that P3ndula posted, but apparently they clashed at Mirabeau on the first lap and retired.

[WSR Fan]

Going back to the issue of the speed difference between GP2 and WSR, if you look at the figures from this weekend the gap was consistently around 5 seconds.

This is the fastest lap of the weekend in each series:


F1 - Fernando Alonso - 1:15.431 - Fastest Q2 time

GP2 - Pastor Maldonado - 1:20.820 (+5.389) - Pole time

WSR - Alvaro Barba - 1:25.776 (+10.345) - Fastest race lap


So the gap between the fastest GP2 and WSR lap of the weekend was 4.956s.

And if you compare the difference between the GP2 and WSR Pole times, the result is:

2006: 4.960

2007: 4.995 (+0.035)

[strider]

Parente and Piccione also crashed. Report here.