Former Formula 1 driver Johnny Herbert has identified that perhaps slowing down the new cars to decrease the frustrations of energy harvesting which has “eroded” the ‘pure experience’ for the drivers.
The new regulations cycle has perhaps been the biggest divider of opinions than any other ruleset in the sport’s history.
With 50-50 hybrid V6 power units requiring constant battery recharging, drivers are now needing to change their natural styles to go slower in higher-speed corners to achieve an overall fast lap time and heighten overtaking possibilities.
It has led to complaints of overall counter-intuition in the cockpit, with a number of drivers complaining about the overall experience of it, as well the potential safety aspects, with faster cars encountering cars that are slower through the harvesting process.
Herbert acknowledged that the new PUs cause a necessity for cars to be slower in corners known for their exciting high-speed nature, and questioned that lowering the megajoule output, as done in qualifying in Suzuka last weekend, could be a solution.
“When it [the PU] is doing its harvesting, like in Suzuka, you’re still handling through 130R to the chicane, and you hear the thing, [it’s] like they’re doing left foot braking in the old days and it shouldn’t be that being an important part of it, because it has to be done to charge the battery,” he told Motorsport Week in an exclusive interview.
“It has to be done in certain places, and it’s always in places where like in Turn 9, Turn 10 [in] Australia is the same thing. So you’re killing the corner, or you’re killing the brake in going into the chicane, because you’re braking 250 yards with the electric motor before you even get there. So the speed is, I don’t know, 50 miles an hour slower, or whatever it may be.”
“And then the challenge is changing for the drivers as well. The driver experience is not that fun at the same time. I could argue, well, it’s just different. It’s just a different toolbox that you’ve got to use for it. But I think the pure driving experience has been eroded, because the challenge has become less, because they’ve changed so much with certain corners, Turn 9 and 10, especially in Australia, for example.
“So I think things are being changed where I think the, which they did drive and then qualified, where the deployment is going to be deployed in a different way. Because I think they’ve got to keep it where it just keeps accelerating, rather than it just sort of accelerating and then harvesting and stopping. I don’t think it’s far off. I don’t think it needs much of a real proper change to do it.”
Johnny Herbert: ‘The harvesting side’ is ‘sort of ruining’ the new F1 regs
Herbert concluded by posing the question that, whilst the cars will be slower overall as a consequence of his suggested remedy of the drivers’ discontent, could it alter the dynamic enough to make overtaking more inclusive and less synthetic?
“Will they end up potentially being a bit slower? Maybe. But if it makes it more enjoyable from the driver’s perspective, but then it makes it more enjoyable when the racing should be good,” he reasoned. “Because I think the cars themselves, the cars, are actually good race cars. You can actually race together. And it’s just the harvesting side of it that’s sort of ruining it at the moment.”
With the revelation from fellow ex-F1 driver Alexander Wurz that the WhatsApp group for the Grand Prix Drivers’ Association is “blowing up” with ideas about how to change the regulations, there will be some serious discussion between now and its return in Miami next month.
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