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When was the last time that an F1 car completed a lap at an average of 241.428 mph?
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If you put the F1 car on an "oval' track and take the wings off (like on CART cars) then I'm sure it will do that kind of speeds.

Anyway, I'm refering to tracks with actual corners ... I don't have the artcile/numbers here (I'll look it up when I get the chance) but there has been a few instances where they had the F1 car and CART car/s on the same track (even if not at the same time) and F1 cars are a lot faster.

As far as 'close racing'/'luck' goes re-read my post again, you'll see that I agreeed with you before you even posted. I just have the part of CART where they bumch up the cars because of an 'incident' - I like my races to run in one succesion from start to the end and let the best car/driver win ... not the luckiest or smartest one.

ps. If you put GP bikes into the equation then they are about 20 secs per lap slower than F1s - they have no downforce and therefore comperatively no cornering/braking grip.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by DavidM
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When was the last time that an F1 car completed a lap at an average of 241.428 mph?

 

the only reason i love the F1 so much is because they don't go around in circles (ovals)! i've never understood why stock cars which has NOTHING to do with its stock counterpart except for the name would generate so much interests in the crowds. aren't GTs, F1s with both right and left turns, sharp turns, U turns, etc. better to watch? i mean, what's so fun about watching the cars go round n' round? just my rant on our great nation's not-so-great motorsport.

 

In the case of CART, its the absolute speed. Imagine AVERAGING 241 mph for 2 mile lap?

I'm not a fan of ovals, and you will never find me watching a Nascar race... I truly prefer the street/road courses. But there is just something about the pure speed of it all...

then again, I guess Patrick Carpentier racing the CF-18 Hornet from a standstill was pretty cool too

 

S2K_CLS - The top speed of F1 cars is purely dictaded by the amount of downforce dialied in via the front/back wings. They set it up as high as possible for all the tracks - that is as high as possible in order to get the fastest lap time. ie. tracks with less corners and a lot of straights end up having a lot less downforce. Given that - if you had an oval which mean (almost no corners) then you'd have also minimal wing (downforce). The weight/power of F1 is a fair bit better than for the CARTs so I'd pressume that it would go faster .... this is just speculation as I do not know of any F1 car attempting to drive on an oval.

[Edited by DavidM on 02-12-2001 at 05:26 AM]

 

All these arguments are fair enough, but from my point of view (on the sofa between the chips and the beer) those points are pretty much irrelevant.

Oval tracks, whoo haaa, what a bore. F1 teams spending more than a small African nations defence budget (although not quite as much as Pink Floyd spend on a concert) to overcome the restrictions set by the FIA, all just so they can compete on pit stop stategies (do those things ever pass each other?).

Give me sports car or touring car racing any day. These things are closer to what we can actually drive, and at least there's some to'in and fro'in between cars.

 

AusS2000 - I agree, to be honest I'm not very happy about the state of either F1 or CART at the moment. In F1 I dislike this whole 'no car can have any performance when around onother car' while in CART I havily dislike the pace car bunching up the whole field. My favourite bit of motorsport happens to be GTPs (and Nation's cup) at the moment.

Though, I still watch every F1 race and every CART race that is not on an oval.

 

Oval racing is a quintessential American form of racing. That is not to say that I will go out of my way to watch it. But racing is more than the "Team of the Year", racing that we get in F1. Personally, I don't care what kind of cars are being driven, if it is competitive, I will watch it. F! has become trite, by the fact that the team with the most money seems to win. Ferarri or McLaren this year, Williams or Bennetton another year, but competition does not exist.
You may not like ovals or Nascar, but at least there you can 15 to 20 different wins in a single season. THat's competition! (And for all of our S2000 breathren in Europe and Japan, watch out the ovals are coming!)
My post has nothing to do with which car is better, sorry. But I prefer to see competitve racing where the biggest difference in the cars is the drivers, not the amount of money that the owner has.
Just my rant of the day.

 

Just for the record, a F1 car will beat a CART car around Road America when it is set-up properly. There is an early 90's F1 Ferrari that races at Road America that absolutely destroys everything including retired CART cars. In fact, one race the car had trouble starting and they started the race without it. The other cars were almost a whole lap ahead when the F1 came out and he ended up winning the race. It was something like a 13 lap race. The car is just awesome to hear and see.

For those that know Road America the car goes though 3 gears going up the hill out of turn 5 and anyone that sees it go up that hill usually has a big smile on their face after watching it!!!

 

Let me say I think this is really a good discussion. So now I'll throw a little monkey wrench in it.

Who are the most skilled drivers/riders

F1
CART
Winston Cup
or
F1 motorcycle







.