With so little downforce required throughout the lap, teams tend to run extremely low-profile rear wings that significantly reduce drag compared to a normal set-up. Monza is a special case in F1, with most teams bringing a unique package to the track that isn’t used again during the season. Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images How do teams prepare for different types of track? Kevin Magnussen, Haas VF-20, Nicholas Latifi, Williams FW43 Other power tracks with long straights include Russia, Mexico, Canada, Baku and Austria, among others. Lewis Hamilton holds the record for the highest average speed recorded over a single lap, averaging 164.267mph (254.362km/h) on his way to pole position at Monza in 2020. Drivers are believed to spend 75% of the lap at full throttle around Monza, and the fastest laps ever recorded in the history of the sport are typically set here. The Italian Grand Prix at Monza is the closest you’ll get to a true power track in F1. However the long straights and high-speed corners on these sectors mean that power still has a big influence on the pecking order. Tracks like Silverstone and Spa feature high downforce sequences that can see the drivers pulling up to 6G in some cases. In particular, Sector 3 in Barcelona - which features a series of low-speed turns - is historically a good gauge for how cars will perform in Monaco, which normally follows Spain on the F1 calendar. Hungary, Imola, Singapore, Spain and Monaco are all examples of high downforce tracks, with relatively short straights and lots of turns putting a greater emphasis on cornering speed. There’s no official guide to what constitutes a high downforce track, but the teams’ approach to each circuit shows where they think downforce is a priority and where power is less important. Photo by: Erik Junius High downforce tracks Lando Norris, McLaren MC元4, Valtteri Bottas, Mercedes AMG F1, Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB15 On both occasions it was the Dutchman’s second consecutive victory on those circuits. Max Verstappen dominated Mexican Grand Prix from second on the grid in 2018, and recovered from an awful start to win the Austrian Grand Prix the following season having fallen from second to eighth on the opening lap. Both of these circuits feature long straights and few high-downforce corners, but other factors have made Red Bull a force to be reckoned with at these venues. Red Bull has traditionally performed well at circuits that reward downforce more than power, but counter-intuitively its most successful tracks in recent seasons have been the Red Bull Ring in Austria and the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez in Mexico. Most cars will stop once or twice over the duration of a race, and knowing which strategy is faster can decide what style a driver needs to adopt to achieve the best possible result. The flipside of this is that more aggressive cornering tends to wear tyres out more quickly, so smoother steering wheel inputs might be needed in order to make the rubber last longer. However it can also reduce performance in a straight line by causing drag, and great drivers are able to work out if they need to be later on the brakes heading into a turn or earlier on the throttle coming out of it to extract the most speed from their car. More downforce creates more grip in corners, which allows drivers to carry more speed and post quicker lap times. All drivers have a subtly different approach to driving an F1 car, and the fastest drivers tend to be the ones who can adapt their style every week to get the best performance out of their car in the unique circumstances presented by each track.
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