World Endurance Championship Data Review Part 2

Following part one of my small series, reviewing the data from the World Endurance Championship 2014, I left a few things to be analysed. Firstly, I’m going to take a closer look at 2014 Le Mans 24hrs and how Audi #2 managed to win the race even though they were in the pits for 58min 12sec!

The first place I will look is at their race pace, compared to there competitors.

I’m going to ignore most of the data you will see in the above table, we shall concentrate on the times in the Le Mans column for now. The table shows average lap times from all the races in the 2014 WEC, I used 140 laps from each car to work out the average lap time, I removed all pit stops and slow laps to try to give the most accurate race pace time. I have also highlighted the fastest car from each round in green.

From the data that is presented in front of us Audi won the Le Mans 24hrs not only because of luck, but a combination of quite a few factors. Probably , and most importantly the car was the quickest in race trim 1.1 seconds quicker than #8 Toyota and 2.1 sec quicker than the #20 Porsche. If you think back to the race, #8, #20, #7, #14 and #1 all experience problems as did the #2 car itself. Audi managed to keep there servicing times to a minimum even though they needed to change a turbo, while there competitors suffered with “bigger problems”. It turns out Audi took just 17mins to change the turbo, please remember that’s a smoking hot engine and turbo that needed to be removed and replaced! I will also credit the designers at Ingolstadt, for making the turbo accessible. When the #2 got back into the race it managed to remain at a quicker pace, keeping all other competitors behind them. Although the Pit Stop table in part 1 doesn’t show it #8 Toyota didn’t lose most of its time in the pits, it actually lost most of it recovering from the early accident a 14min 40sec lap didn’t help. I must also add that the #7 Toyota was leading by some way, when it suffered an electric fault putting it out of the race.

Further notes from our average lap time data was just how dominate the #8 Toyota was throughout the season, having the fastest race pace on, quickest in 6 of the 8 races. Porsche #14 was quickest at the final round at Interlagos where it secured Porsche’s first win, since the return of the German manufacturer giant.

Now it’s time to take a look at my imaginary monster WEC circuit, it consists of one lap of each circuit added together. Total distance for a single lap would be 52.67km (32.1mi). The times I have recoreded are, an ideal lap time, this is based on the quickest race lap (think of these as sector times) of each car added together to give us an ideal time. Then using the average race data, I have created an average race pace lap time too. I have also calculated the difference between ideal and average to show the seconds lost when driving at race pace.

Lets start by taking it look at the results, no prizes for guessing who was the quickest, Anthony Davison and Sebastian Buemi dominated all season, ideal lap time 3.5 seconds quicker than anyone else and average time 4 seconds quicker! In second place comes the sister car #7 from Toyota Hybrid Racing. The rest of the pack becomes a little more complicated, where the #1 is quicker than the #2 over a race distance the #2 was faster in a single lap. #14 Porsche was on pace with #1 over a single lap but a full second down over a race distance. The car that disappointed the most was the overall pace of the #20 with Mark Webber, most of us are F1 fans before we become fans of any other racing series, we all wanted Mark to excel. Unfortunately this never really got going with a slower/unreliable car at the start of the season, an average middle with a podium or two, then a bad ending with the huge accident suffered on the start/finish line at Brazil. I want to add it wasn’t all of Mark’s doing, sportscar drivers are a team, and as a team, they will need to improve to make progress in 2015.

I want to quickly mention the #1 Audi, not only did it turn out to be the final year for Tom Kristensen before he retires, but he, and his team mates managed to keep the gap between ideal lap time and average the closest throughout the season, only losing an average of 3.5sec per round.

Finally I want to leave you all with this final stat, Tom Kristensen, 9 time Le Mans Winner. Thank you TK.

Road to Le Mans 2013

Spa-Franchamps the second round of the World Endurance championship threw up a unique opportunity to compare the Le Mans challengers head to head. I have trawled through the data to see who has gained an advantage leading up to the big race. The results of my findings may surprise you.
I will be looking in detail at the Audi R18 E-Tron Quattro longtail (#3), Toyota TS030 2013 (#7), Rebellion Toyota (Lola) (#12) and the Strakka Racing HPD ARX-03c (#21).
We are concentrating on Le Mans so as a result I will not be using any data from sector 2 of the Spa lap and concentrating on sectors 1 & 3. I will also ignore the 2012 spec Toyota as it won’t run at Le mans neither have included the 2013 short(er) tailed E-Tron Quattro, for the same reason.
I will start with sector 1, I have selected laps 2-11 for this example. I like to get the data with as few variables as possible, i.e. traffic, no mechanical problems. I also used these laps to get the cars and drivers in their freshest state too.

The opening 4 laps at least are free of traffic for the LMP1 battle and although Audi #3 (gray line) set the fastest sector time 37.741 on lap 3 the Toyota #7 (blue Line) appears to be the more consistent through the data selected. Another surprising little fact to me was that the Toyota had the fastest average sector time to of 35.035secs, that adds up 0.226secs ahead of the arch enemy #3 Audi. Surprised? You will also notice the clar gaps from the Audi and Toyota to the Rebellion (red line) and Strakka (black line). The data from the Rebellion clearly shows that they are by far the most consistent of the cars, Nick Heidfeld was the driver at the time and consistency like that will surely make it hard for Rebellion to keep him. Strakka on the other hand are clearly lacking the pace to directly compete with the works cars and sadly it also appears they are now a step behind Rebellion even with the upgrade to the ARX-03c chassis.
Now time for the final sector, the data was gathered in exactly the same way as the first.

Straight away looking at this I noticed the #7 Toyota is below the line of the #3 Audi (the lower the line the faster the sector/Lap) Toyota clearly have the pace to match the Audi, I to was extremely surprised to hear Toyota complaining about “Balance of Performance” I have no way of seeing if the Audi was sand bagging but from the data I have presented Toyota clearly have the pace if not the reliability. A fact proven once again by the Toyota’s average sector 3 time (31.699) being ahead of Audi (31:917).
Rebellion once again demonstrating the mechanical consistency of Nick Heidfeld. The data line barely fluctuating from start to finish unlike the the 2 works cars ahead. The gap between Rebellion and Strakka remains a near enough constant of around 0.500secs throughout the race (more on this later).
Finally let’s take a look at some overall lap times, below I have gathered the average lap time from every 10 racing laps, I also taken out any unexpected laps i.e. out laps and incidents, as it’s raw speed we are interested in today.

We are now looking at overall lap speed throughout the race and you will notice the data for the #7 Toyota ends halfway through the race, due to Hybrid trouble. I am in no doubt that Toyota have the pace of the Audi’s and I wouldn’t right them off just yet has the evidence here shows.
I also think the consistency of the Rebellion once again a key note from this line chart, will keep them within touching distance of the works cars should another hybrid have a hissy fit. I can’t see them doing it on outright pace but they are not far away. Rebellion also conformed to me direct via Twitter that they will be running the wheel arch extensions at Le Mans. Another little note Rebellion spent the least amount of time in the pits 7:38Secs compared to #3 Audi of 9:20!
Now finally to Strakka you will see the first stint of the race driven by Jonny Kane was just about on par with Rebellion, the second stint however is a different matter as you can see the, the lap time really take a jump up and consequently the team lost time and distance to their rivals. I don’t like saying anything bad but it appears Nick wasn’t quite at the same pace as Jonny and Danny. Maybe there was an issue with the car that we weren’t aware of that could explain the difference but the lap time to recover towards the end of the race. I wish them all the best of course…..
Final, final conculsion is… Well it’s Le Mans and anything could happen but just to be sure I’m off to the bookies to put £5 on a Toyota 1-2.
James Foster.

Audi v Toyota v Rebellion Silverstone Speed Trap

My opening example is the data from Silverstone speed traps from the first round of the FIA World Endurance Championship. I have pitched the top 10 speeds recorded by the #1 Audi, #8 Toyota and #12 Rebellion.

You’ll notice straightaway that the #8 Toyota has the slowest recorded speed in all 10 laps, I was originally surprised by this too. The obvious reason for this is down to the setup route Toyota chose with their cars for Silverstone, preferring a complete high downforce setup.

Rebellion on the other hand are a lot closer to Audi in terms of top speed than I anticipated, even with the recently installed aero upgrade. This explains, to a degree why Rebellion at the start of the Silverstone race were chasing the #7 Toyota of Alex Wurz.

Audi on the other-hand were the class of the field as you would expect with their latest 2013 spec E-tron Quattro. Recording a top speed of 272Kph (169Mph).

With the recently announced debut for the Audi E-Tron Quattro Long tail that will compete at the second race of the season, joined by the latest Toyota and possably a slippery version of the Rebellion. Spa already shows signs of a classic and you can rest assured I will trawl through the data.

All your comments and feedback are welcome.

Audi v Rebellion in Detail

Many of you who follow me on twitter may be aware of my recent interest in the LMP1 privateer situation in the World Endurance Championship.

I will attempt to analyse the data from the #12 Rebellion and pitch it against the current World Endurance champions Audi #1 E-tron Quattro.

I’m going to start by breaking down the sector times and compare them, I have selected the first 10 laps of the race to keep the varibles to a minimum and also to get the cars at ultimate pace. I will start with the obvious, Sector 1.

You will notice starightaway that Audi was the faster car but we expected that, it’s not that I expect the Rebellion Toyota to be faster but it’s the amount of distance between the cars that we are intrested in.
Reviewing the data as you will see above my first impressions are not quite so good. I calulated the average distance between the cars to be 1.3 seconds in Sector 1 alone. Once the cars hit traffic on lap 4 for the Audi, and lap 5 for the rebellion, the splits between them flutuate somewhat.

Once again the Audi was the faster of the 2 cars, until once again traffic appears on the scene. The average time distance between them in sector 2 is an eye-watering 1.4 seconds. So currently the Rebellion is 2.7s slower on average and we havent even got to sector 3 yet. An early conclusion would be that Rebellion’s drivers need to push through traffic to gain any advantage possible and minmise the gap.

 Again first impressions prove the #1 Audi faster through the laps until lap 9 where the Audi must have caught traffic at a  bad time. The average distance through sector 3 reads better than the previous sectors at 0.7s slower, however it’s only a 31s sector mainly consisting of the Hanger straight, Stowe, Vale, Club and across the line. I proved a previous blog that the rebellion has near enough the same straight line speed as the Audi but it appears they have sacrificed downforce as proven by the slower times in the previous sectors.

I also checked the overall time both cars spent in the pits during the race. Both pitted 8 times, The Audi being Diesel and Hybrid is aloud only 61 litres but the Rebellion Toyota has a 75 litres allowance. On the face of it used think Rebellion could gain sometime back by pitting less than the Audi? However as I just mentioned they both pit 8 times. So looking into it further did rebellion gain anytime back by not changing the tyres as much? Well I can say the #1 Audi spent a combined time of 9 min 44 seconds in the pits and the #12 Rebellion 9 mins 48 seconds. Not much to be gained back in the pits then, with similar times spent servicing the cars.

Still struggling to find anywhere were Rebellion have had a chance to gain anything back from the Audi during the race, I have looked through plenty of data and I can find no evidence where the Rebellion is suprior or the FIA/ACO have manufactored the sporting/technical regulations to give the LMP1 privateers a chance to snatch a podium should any of the top cars suffer with problems. My calulations have shown that over a lap on average they trail by 3.4 seconds and have proven that Rebellion’s pit crew are just as savvy at servicing as Joest.

I fear the evidence suggests that FIA/ACO want to put off (intentionally or not) privateer teams from enetering LMP1 unless they give them more of a break. I don’t think giving them bigger fuel tanks is the answer surely it just adds weight, incresses tyre wear and possable component fatigue. Also bear in mind both cars have the same base weight of 900kg. I’m not claiming to have the answers but just pointing out something needs to be addressed.

Hopefully the the big news that is due from Bart Hayden (Team Manager of Rebellion) at Spa will be a step towards securing the privateer in the top class of sportcar racing, long term.

All comments and thoughts are welcome.