SINGAPORE - THREE new features have been introduced to make this
year's Formula One season more exciting - but that has not blurred
the lines between man and machine, former F1 racing driver David
Coulthard insisted on Saturday, after a meet-and-greet session with
about 100 of his fans. On the contrary, he said it reminded him of
Ayrton Senna in the 1980s, a genius racing driver and three-time F1
world champion who died in a crash during the 1994 Italian Grand
Prix.
To increase the chances of overtaking this year, a driver can
leverage on the new Drag Reduction System (DRS) that adjusts the
car's rear wing for greater speed and the Kinetic Energy Recovery
System (Kers) that recovers and converts heat from braking to
electrical energy for up to 6.67s. However, such tools still need
to be called upon by the driver, as demonstrated in the last
Shanghai GP race, Coulthard said. In that race, McLaren's Lewis
Hamilton critically overtook his teammate Jenson Button by firing
up his Kers twice at the start-finish line.
Said Coulthard, 'There is a misperception that the drivers are
less important than they used to be and that people can look back
with rose-coloured spectacles and think that the pioneers in the
1950s were the real drivers.'
Pitstops have also become crucial to a podium finish. According
to Coulthard, tyres in the last 15 years were so efficient that
they made little difference to the qualifying and racing timings.
The F1 pundit said that the new Pirelli tyres, however, behaved
differently with the new compounds. The tyres now degrade
drastically and lose their performance at the end. Again, Hamilton
effortlessly overtook Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel in Shanghai
because he had much fresher tyres. Hamilton went on to win the
race.
Coulthard, who first joined the Williams F1 team as a test
driver in 1993, said this type of racing would have suited him
better at the end of his racing career, which lasted from 1994 to
2008. The new season is more about balancing the grip of tyres over
time than revving the V8 engines and then sprinting, Coulthard
said. He remembered how in 1987, five-time F1 champion Nigel
Mansell famously overtook teammate Nelson Picquet in Silverstone
despite losing around 30s after a pitstop. Mansel had reeled in his
teammate just after 10 to 15 laps.
'I think we've had a lot of excitement in the three Grand Prix
we had this year. And the drivers, teams and pitstops are a key
part of that,' said Coulthard. He will be performing stunts in a
Red Bull Racing show car in an 800m closed stretch of Orchard Road
on Sunday from 4pm onwards for the Red Bull Speed Street
Singapore.