Latest news with #hybridpowertrains
Motor Trend
28-05-2025
- Automotive
- Motor Trend
Fire, Rain, and Crashes: I Picked the Right Indy 500 To Be My First
I've been in an automotive writer and editor for more than 20 years, yet somehow, I'd never made it to the Greatest Spectacle in Racing. That needed fixing, so I accepted an invite from Honda to be their guest at this year's race—history's first with hybridized powertrains, which Honda knows a thing or two about—and I'm extremely glad I did. 0:00 / 0:00 I'm not sure how or why it took so long. I live in Detroit, a short drive from Indy. I love watching the 500. I've attended all kinds of races over the years. I've driven in a handful, too. And I'd even been to Indianapolis Motor Speedway before for a motorsports event: The 2005 United States F1 Grand Prix, which you may recall was the spectacle where 14 of 20 cars pulled out of the race after the formation lap due to tire safety concerns. But with Ferrari destroying backmarker Minardi and Jordan teams that year, this year's Indy 500 was the first actual race I'd seen at IMS. And it was absolute chaos. For those that didn't watch the 2025 Indy 500, a recap: Rain delayed the start by about 30 minutes while the track was dried. Scott McLaughlin crashed his Pennzoil Team Penske Chevy on the parade laps while warming his tires. Marco Andretti, who only runs a handful of races these days, hit the wall in Turn 1 just after the green flag, saying he was pushed high. The yellow caution flag was out until lap 8. A light rain started falling on lap 18, bringing the yellow out until lap 30. At this point, more than half the race had been run under yellow. On lap 74, Alex Rossi pitted for repairs due to an overheated gearbox, but a fireball erupted when the gearbox ignited spilled fuel. The fire leapt over the wall and a crew member needed to be sprayed down, as well. Luckily, quick-acting members of Rossi's team and the IMS safety crew got the flames extinguished before tragedy could strike. Eight laps later, Rinus VeeKay lost control entering the pits and hit the inside wall. Polesitting rookie Robert Shwartzman hit three of his crew members (with one receiving minor injuries) and the wall in his stall after completing 87 laps, with the subsequent damage forcing his retirement. Four laps after that, Kyla Larson, who was attempting 'a Double'—running the 500 and NASCAR's Coca-Cola 600 the same day—lost control on the bottom of the track and, on his way to the outside wall, took out Kyffin Simpson and Sting Ray Robb. (We weren't even halfway through the race and 8 cars—nearly a quarter of the 33-car field—were in the garages. Things stayed relatively incident-free the rest of the way, with just two mechanical failures: Josef Newgarden after 135 laps, thwarting his run for three Indy 500 wins in a row—and Ryan Hunter-Reay 26 laps later. These must have been particularly bitter pills to swallow, as Newgarden had worked his way from a back-row staring position due to post-qualifying penalites all the way to sixth, and Hunter-Reay had led the race for 48 laps. In all, 12 cars finished on the lead lap with the victory, winner's wreath, and bottle of milk going to Honda's Álex Palou for Chip Ganassi Racing. It was three-time IndyCar champ Palou's fifth win in six races this year, continuing a dominant start to the 2025 season, but his first Indianapolis 500 victory in six attempts. As for my personal impressions, I'd forgotten the sheer size of the place, just how much larger something that holds roughly 3.5 times as many people as the largest football stadium in the world (Go Blue) could be. Luckily, movement around the paddock and track is easy, even if everything involves a decent hike. And during the first half of the race, you could barely get done talking about one incident before another grabbed your attention—Rossi's fire in particular. His box was directly in front of us, and it was genuinely terrifying to see fire spread that fast (it leapt immediately behind the pit wall, as well) and equally impressive to see the safety workers work with such speed and efficiency. Most notably, it was deeply relieving to see the crew member who caught the brunt of the flames walk to the medical facility under his own power. In fact, it appears everyone involved in the various incidents was relatively unharmed. At the end of the race, with Honda clinching a win, the vibes in the suite were sky high. And if I'm honest, the people-watching after the race while waiting in traffic was almost worth the trip by itself. My only disappointment is that the green-flag racing wasn't particularly exciting. The combination of light rain, a cold track, and the coldest ambient temperature for a 500 since 1992 made for a busy day for those in the flagstand and race control. It was only once the track warmed up—and the field was significantly thinned—in the second half that the race got relatively clean. But even if this year's Greatest Spectacle in Racing was more spectacle than racing, I'm hooked. See you next year.
Yahoo
12-05-2025
- Automotive
- Yahoo
Why F1 cars have really gained hundreds of kilograms over the years
Seventy-five years ago this week, when Giuseppe Farina roared across the finishing line to win the first world championship grand prix at Silverstone, he did so in an Alfa Romeo 158 weighing – depending on fluids and which sources you use – between 650 and 700kg. When Formula 1 adopted a minimum weight for the first time in 1961, the figure was set at 450kg. Under the most recent ruleset, teams have been struggling – note the amount of unpainted carbon fibre on display – to hit the current minimum of 800kg. On the face of it, not a fantastic advert for three-quarters of a century of scientific progress. Advertisement Obviously the figure of 800kg now includes the driver but even when viewed through a more rigorous prism, which involves going back to 1995 when the car and driver weight was first combined, the resulting figure makes for an ugly comparison: 595kg. The difference is 205kg. In the past three decades only the price of Oasis gig tickets has inflated more egregiously. 'We'd all like the cars to be a lot lighter,' FIA single-seater director Nikolas Tombazis told 'Some of the solutions being mooted [in terms of future powertrains] would lead to significantly lighter cars, which is what everyone would like. 'It's a trade-off between financials, technological freedom and how cutting-edge Formula 1 is, environmental considerations, and excitement.' Advertisement Around 100kg of the weight gain came as a result of adopting hybrid powertrains. The current minimum weight for a hybrid power unit is 151kg – compare that with, say, a late 1990s 3-litre V10 which weighed between 90kg and 100kg. Nikolas Tombazis, FIA Single Seater Director Nikolas Tombazis, FIA Single Seater Director Andy Hone / Motorsport Images Andy Hone / Motorsport Images While the PU minimum weight of 151kg includes the hybrid system, it doesn't include the turbocharging mechanism or, more significantly, the cooling system, which is vastly more complex than the plumbing required by a 1990s engine. The days of having two simple radiators handling the majority of heat management are long gone. Advertisement Around 50kg of additional weight can be accounted for by safety features such as stronger side-impact structures and the halo. Clever engineering and design can mitigate the effects of having to resist a stricter crash-testing regime but, to an extent, with additional strength comes weight. Given the growing list of likely injuries averted by modern safety features, this is not an element anyone sensible in F1 would wish to row back on. The remaining 55kg or so of bloat is accounted for by a mix of elements, some of which it could be possible to reset. When former F1 'ringmaster' Bernie Ecclestone rolled out of the wrong side of bed early in 2015 and declared the cars should be wider and more aggressive-looking, he did this sporting category a great disservice because the inevitable result was additional weight and made greater difficulty in overtaking. Wider, bigger-diameter wheels have also had an effect – one being mitigated slightly for next year since the front wheels will be 25mm narrower, the rears 30mm. Not a massive amount but, again, there are performance considerations. Advertisement One change which would be politically difficult to execute, but could reduce car weight, is to reduce aerodynamic and mechanical complexity. 'We can go towards negating some of the dimensional aspects of cars, but it has to be possible to come back to a car that is simpler than it is now,' said Tombazis. Race start Race start Fadel Senna - AFP - Getty Images Fadel Senna - AFP - Getty Images 'And that is an interesting philosophical issue: why cars nowadays are a lot more complicated. The reason people design more complicated cars is because they have 'near-perfect' simulation capability. 'Take the cooling system, for example: cars in the past used to have an entry duct and a radiator. And then the air after the radiator would find its way out through the bodywork and eventually go out of the back. Nowadays, there's an entry duct, a radiator, and an exit duct, all fully profiled with little winglets and turning vanes. Advertisement 'As another example, the front floor now has a damper and a full system to operate at exactly the regulatory limits of deflection. 'So, there are many performance-increasing features on cars, all incremental, that make the car much more complicated – and heavier.' It is famously difficult to return a genie to the bottle. No F1 team would give up an area of performance gain without a fight. And this is where the battle lines are forming ahead of the 2026 season, as senior engineers have been openly questioning whether the relatively modest 30kg weight cut planned for the new ruleset is even possible. It might – or should – be. And more would be better. Advertisement But if the trend towards weight gain is to be meaningfully reversed, teams are going to have to give up some long-cherished performance features. Read Also: F1 teams braced for battle to hit 'very aggressive' 2026 weight limit To read more articles visit our website.
