What F1 can learn from IndyCar for 2021

Through Formula 1's hybrid era Lewis Hamilton has averaged 10 victories a season, and his imperious pole position in Melbourne suggested Sunday would tick off yet another. Not so, though: although Hamilton led from the start, a virtual safety car period, together with a miscalculation by Mercedes, left Sebastian Vettel in the lead, and - despite a recent visit from the Ministry of Silly Haircuts - the Ferrari driver won his second Australian Grand Prix on the trot.

"We were lucky today," Seb said, and he was right. One doesn't know what Lewis said to his team behind closed doors, but his outward post-race demeanour - calm and easy - did him credit: presumably he took comfort from the thought that yet again Mercedes starts a season with the car to beat.

The weekend before Melbourne, in the midst of a blizzard at Goodwood, I chatted to David Coulthard about the coming year, and his opening remark was on the money: "Based on testing, it's encouraging that Ferrari are quick - but I do have to believe that Mercedes have more up their sleeve.

"It seems, though," DC went on, "that Ferrari are as competitive as they were last year - which was good enough to win the world championship, had they been a bit more together. Martin [Brundle] reckons that if Fernando Alonso had been in the Ferrari, he'd have won the title, and I think that's a fair comment.

"This is not to say that Vettel isn't a great driver - of course he is - but when things don't go right, he's got to control his 'throwing toys out of the pram' behaviour, which you don't really see from a Lewis or a Fernando. Seb definitely has a problem with that - and Baku last year was a case in point. What I found interesting was not so much the incident when he nudged into Lewis as the fact that the absolute emotions of the individuals came out.

"Seb's instinctive response was, 'I'm right, and everyone else is wrong', rather than, 'I got too close to the car in front...' I would have automatically thought it was my fault - but maybe that's the difference with these guys who win championships!

"As for Lewis, in Baku I remember him saying something along the lines of, 'We should have this conversation, face to face, out of the car'. It was said in a very calm way, but with absolute commitment."

Very similar, I suggested, to how - in difficult moments - Mika Hakkinen used to deal with Michael Schumacher. "Yes," said DC, "absolutely the same thing. There was no bravado in the way Mika did it, and Lewis was the same - it was just a firm statement.

"Pushed absolutely to his raw racing instincts, Lewis is a fighter, while Seb, pushed to his backstop, is emotional and reactive. You could argue that both of those characteristics are what makes them great, but equally for Seb it was undoubtedly a weakness last year, and it's been like that throughout his career - remember the coming-together with Webber in Turkey [in 2010]?

"Lewis is a fighter, while Seb, pushed to his backstop, is emotional and reactive" David Coulthard

"He blamed Mark, but it was entirely his fault - he moved over - and it was the same in Singapore last year, when he was the catalyst that led to that whole series of events at the start.

"Michael has always been Seb's idol, and in many ways he's like him, not least in never admitting to being at fault. I once said to Michael, 'Surely you must be wrong sometimes', and he thought about it, then said, 'Not that I remember...' I said, 'Well, surely when you're at home with your wife, you're sometimes in the wrong...' and he said, 'No.'

"I always found it fascinating that some of these people had a trait that I just didn't have - like anyone, I had my defence mechanisms when things weren't going well, but these guys... despite their soft exterior, there's a really hard core there."

Looking to the year ahead, Coulthard unsurprisingly anticipated a repeat of 2017, with Red Bull thereabouts, but the world championship fight essentially confined to Mercedes and Ferrari - and, more particularly to Hamilton and Vettel. That said, did he think Valtteri Bottas could worry Lewis more this year?

"He has to - otherwise it's goodbye. Definitely there's a fast racing driver there, but sometimes last year he seemed to be in a spiral of self-doubt - which you never see from the Alonsos and Hamiltons. This is a telling year for Valtteri. He knows the team now, and if Lewis has one of his off weekends, he has to be winning - which wasn't always the case last year."

It struck me in 2017, I said, that maybe it was only now - in his absence - that we began to appreciate just how good Nico Rosberg had been. "Yeah, that's true - you can't deny he kept Hamilton honest. OK, you always felt that, wheel to wheel, Lewis would come out on top, but still there were plenty of weekends when Nico plain beat him.

"He told me recently that you never knew which Lewis was going to turn up at a race - and you always knew on Thursday whether you'd got the beating of him that weekend. Because Valtteri didn't really bother him, he always looked really strong last year.

"Nico also said that sometimes Lewis would be nowhere in practice, but come qualifying he could deliver a lap out of nowhere, and that was so annoying! It was the same for me with Mika, and it's that Federer thing, that je ne sais quoi that separates the great from the rest - if I knew what it was, I'd have bottled it!"

On we moved to the other Ferrari driver: surely, I suggested, this has to be Raikkonen's last year.

"Well, you'd think so - I mean, last year was his last year, and the one before that! Kimi remains a great talent, and in his younger years was one of the quickest out there, but when he and I were together at McLaren, I never felt he put in as much effort as I did, or any of my other team-mates.

"Kimi was always pretty detached - in those days we had tyre wars, and I'd pick a tyre, and he'd go with that, on the basis that that was the best choice, and he could drive it a bit more quickly. You could see that as being either energy-efficient - or just a bit lazy.

"All the evidence is that Kimi is past his best, but he can still win races" David Coulthard

"All the evidence is that Kimi is past his best, but he can still win races. There's nothing to suggest he can worry Seb over the whole season - that's one of the reasons he's still in the team - but Nigel Mansell won a championship at 39, didn't he?

"Personally, I would like to have seen Charles Leclerc in the Ferrari this year, because he really is a rising star, and I worry that at Sauber he'll just get lost in the noise. Having said that, it does seem that Sauber are now on a trajectory - they've got investment and they've got serious Ferrari support.

"Leclerc has to beat Marcus Ericsson consistently - and he should do that without much trouble. You think back to how Ayrton Senna stood out at Toleman, and Alonso at Minardi - whatever they're driving, the really special ones stand out immediately."

On to Red Bull, the team in which Coulthard spent the last four years of his career.

Max Verstappen, we know, is a prodigy, but still it amazes me, I said, that some appear almost to be writing Daniel Ricciardo off.

"Yes," David said, "and that's a big mistake. OK, last year it did look as though the tide was turning towards Max, but Daniel, too, has great speed, and he's the best overtaker in the business - sometimes he comes from so far back it's unbelievable.

"Daniel's contract is up at the end of this year, and I do wonder if he's already signed a pre-contract somewhere else, which is common practice in Formula 1 - a year or two ahead someone'll buy an option on first right of refusal. I wouldn't be surprised if he ended up staying at Red Bull because someone else had an option and couldn't make a decision."

In a way, I said, Ricciardo is in an invidious position: logically, after all, you would consider leaving Red Bull only for Mercedes or Ferrari, where it seems that Esteban Ocon and Leclerc, respectively, are already being lined up.

"Yes, it's true. On the other hand, the tide, relative to your team-mate, can suddenly turn. There were seasons when I did OK against Mika - but they weren't the key seasons, so maybe it's when the chance of the championship really is there that these special drivers find that little extra.

"Undoubtedly there are periods when a car suits one driver more than the other. Look at Mark Webber's last year at Red Bull with Seb - because he was heavier, he couldn't get the weight distribution as far forward as Seb. What I'm saying is, maybe this year's Red Bull will be Danny's car.

"In my opinion, Red Bull has the strongest driver pairing in the paddock. I think there's a super league, which is Fernando, Lewis, Daniel, Max and - putting aside all the emotional flaws - Sebastian. They're the exceptional drivers, and then - either waiting to get into that group, or having stepped out of it - there's Kimi, Valtteri, Hulkenberg, Sainz, Ocon, Leclerc..."

And Vandoorne?

"In my opinion, Red Bull has the strongest driver pairing in the paddock" David Coulthard

"Well, yes, Stoffel - to be defined. He had a tough year in 2017, although I know he was up against Fernando. The thing is, with Honda the way it was, we don't know, for example, how many times the McLaren drivers qualified without the right settings, because they just couldn't be used.

"Now, with Renault engines, the spotlight is really on McLaren. The enigma of the team is that they go from high-level dominance to mediocrity and confusion. The PR machine has been putting out that they had one of the best cars last year - but now it's show-and-tell, because they've got the same engine as Red Bull.

"It's terrible that for four seasons Alonso has not been a factor in Formula 1. When we look back on his career, they'll be defined as 'the lost years', won't they? Just absolutely wasted.

"I'm a massive fan of Fernando - I think he's incredible, and it's a crying shame that in recent years we've missed him having the opportunity to show how great he is. It's funny, you know... I've got all his numbers, but somehow I don't talk to him in the same way I talk to other drivers because quite honestly I feel a bit over-awed - a fanboy."

Testing suggested that Renault and, particularly, Haas have taken a significant step since last season, and Melbourne confirmed it.

"Renault," said DC, "have two good - potentially great - drivers. From the start I believed in Nico Hulkenberg - he's a big lad, and gets some disadvantages from that, but I've always rated him - and Carlos Sainz definitely deserves to be in a factory team. I hope they move forward - it would be a reward for Renault's investment in the sport, buying the team back from Genii and so on."

In Australia the Haas team - now campaigning what Alonso only half-jokingly describes as 'last year's Ferrari' - impressed everyone by qualifying its cars in the top 10, and it was painful that, after running strongly in the race, both were eliminated by botched pitstops.

"Haas have clearly gone up a gear," said Coulthard. "I haven't seen Kevin Magnussen enough to really get a feel for him, but he's a confident guy, that's for sure, doing things on his own terms, and Romain Grosjean... we know he has reasonable speed, but these days he's got such a reputation as a moaner, hasn't he? One of those guys needs to be regularly beating the other, or otherwise they'll just become known as journeymen."

Through winter testing the Honda engine - now in a Toro Rosso, of course - ran virtually trouble-free, and all in the team raved about the new relationship.

"Yes," said David, "and the thought occurs that it would just be Alonso's luck for Honda now to start coming good. In the tests the engine certainly ran reliably - I can't really understand how they've been able to turn it around that quickly from where they were, but the Honda story is interesting because it will influence what happens to Red Bull in the future.

"Brendon Hartley is getting a second chance, and he knows he's got one year to really show something - maybe one day we'll see he was just a bit too nice a guy, I don't know. Pierre Gasly is also a lovely young man, so it's a battle between two good guys, both fast racing drivers - but if one of them is regularly in front, we'll probably lose the other, and the Red Bull system will bring in someone else."

After several impressive seasons, Force India - as ever working with loaves and fishes - appears to have taken a downward turn in 2018. Wherever the team should be in the pecking order, I said, for the sake of his apparently glittering future Ocon needs to bury Perez this season.

"Sergio Perez has great talent in certain circumstances, but he doesn't have those moments all the time" David Coulthard

"Yep, he does. Sergio has great talent in certain circumstances, but he doesn't have those moments all the time. Esteban's a really nice kid, with great speed - and when you've got someone fast, and coming from a humble background, you just want them to do well, don't you?

"Force India have done an amazing job, but it might be difficult for them this year with a car that hasn't really been developed much, because of budget constraints - I hope I'm wrong about that."

And last, Williams, with whom Coulthard's F1 career began. The new car, more adventurous than those of the recent past, proved off the pace during testing, and in Melbourne failed to make an impression.

"Of course I've always had tremendous respect for Williams, but beyond that they've always been seen as a great engineering outfit, and they've been given a lot of credit by the paddock and press - everyone wants to see Williams do well. At the moment, though, they seem to have some difficulties, and what might be considered a... financially-motivated driver line-up..."

Claire Williams, I said, has told us it's 'inappropriate' to say things like that.

"Oh, don't get me started! There are so many things that are considered 'inappropriate' these days, aren't there? I'm starting to feel that the paddock may be losing... not its affection for Williams, but... I know they run a very tight ship, and they have a nice business - but this is motor racing, and Frank's a racer and Patrick Head was a racer.

"I suppose what I'm trying to say is that I'd like to see them go all-in with the money to come up with something - a double-diffuser type of thing - rather than simply doing a nice engineering job, and making a bit of profit for the shareholders at the end of the year.

"It'll be interesting to see how Lance Stroll and Sergey Sirotkin get on - I'm hesitant in my words because I'm so affectionate about Williams, but I hope the team has a year where they can look at people like me who are having a moment of doubt, and say, 'Don't ever doubt us...'"

Having talked through the teams and drivers, we went on to the state of play in the sport.

In Bahrain, Ross Brawn is to present to the teams a template of the next Formula 1, and I thought it encouraging that FIA President Jean Todt recently said he believed Ferrari should lose its right of veto over rules. Sergio Marchionne has, of course, threatened to withdraw the team if 'the DNA of Formula 1 is not respected', by which he means, of course, if the hybrid engines in their current state are jettisoned, and if a cost cap is imposed to end a financial arms race in which only Ferrari and Mercedes can compete.

This hybrid era, I said, has spawned what are to me remarkably silly cars, terrifyingly expensive, carrying all manner of unsightly 'aero' guaranteed to damage racing, weighing the same as an Auto Union from 80 years ago...

"I couldn't agree more," said Coulthard. "As Adrian Newey said, 'In my McLaren years the car weighed 605kg - and had 20-odd kilos of ballast.' Those cars felt like grand prix cars - now we're at more than 740kg.

"This is a consequence of all the hybrid, 'save the planet', 'road-car relevant' bullshit that attaches to Formula 1 these days. Yes, the engines, with all the attendant bits and pieces, produce a lot of horsepower - but they need to, because of the weight of all the bloody bits and pieces. And in the end you finish up with the same performance you had before all this nonsense started!

"We've lost a lot of what Formula 1 is supposed to be" David Coulthard

"It's absolutely ridiculous - like giving everyone a backpack of 20 kilos to carry all the time, because it contains something that makes your heart live longer, but the downside is that now you need extra muscles in your legs, so you need more blood pumped to them, which makes your heart work harder... I'm not putting that terribly well, but you get the gist.

"The thing is, I don't like lying to our fans - fundamentally I'm a fan myself. We've got 743-kilo cars, with all that hybrid technology that people want to celebrate - and in the meantime we've lost a lot of what Formula 1 is supposed to be.

"When my son arrived at Goodwood this morning, and heard the cars being fired up, he said, 'Daddy, why are they all so loud?' I said, 'Well, that's what a racing car was - and should be'."

In considering the rules for 2021, Brawn and his colleagues could do worse than look at the latest Indycars, now shorn of much of the downforce they had before. While the Australian Grand Prix produced precisely five overtaking moves, the opening race of the IndyCar season at St Petersburg was a delight, with greatly improved racing - and cars actually sliding.

"I don't see many IndyCar races," said DC, "because I'm away so much, but I watched the race from St Pete, and thought it was brilliant - the cars looked great, and, as you say, they were sliding around, which fans always love to see.

"In F1 we've got greatly increased downforce - what the hell were we thinking? Of course it made the cars quicker - but are we surprised there's no overtaking? What struck me the other weekend was that IndyCar still has a raw quality that Formula 1 has lost - and needs to get back.

"When it comes to the next Formula 1, Liberty and the FIA together should say, 'These are the rules - whether or not you compete is up to you...'"