How F1 teams are attempting to negotiate Vegas unknowns

Sin City. A race location to sum up motorsport’s intrinsic contradictions, especially at the very top. In just a few days’ time, the planet’s best and most complex single seaters will be racing around the monolithic buildings
where all manner of indulgence can be found.

Las Vegas and gambling are synonymous. So too, really, are F1 and unpredictable entertainment. Except, of course, there are thousands of people dedicated to making the championship’s entertainment spectacle as dull as possible in the pursuit of victory: the teams. For the 10 F1 squads, planning and optimisation are the preferred buzzwords. Surprises are generally not welcomed…

The teams have known since last spring they would be racing again in Vegas; not on a hastily converted car park like the two unloved Caesars Palace GPs in the early 1980s, but centre-stage in a night race set on a 3.9-mile track including the city’s iconic Strip. It was revealed as Formula 1’s first Saturday race since the 1985 South African Grand Prix at Kyalami (discounting the sprint events held since 2021), while the midnight
start time for qualifying and 10pm getaway for the race stand out too.

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Since last summer, starting with its giant
pit and paddock building, the dedicated Las Vegas Grand Prix company
that is organising and running the race in conjunction with the city authorities has been building the event. This involved shutting
down areas in stages, sometimes even single road lanes at a time, around the track layout to add in the base infrastructure.

But for the teams, the track already exists – in their circuit simulators. For any new F1 race, the FIA (this information specifically distributed by race director Niels Wittich) supplies the teams with track edge and 3D centreline information as a CAD data file and a PDF. There is no set cut-off date for this enshrined in F1’s rules, but the FIA’s final event reference plans come in at a maximum of 30 days out from any new race occurring.

The supplied data includes pit entry and exit locations and angles, so the teams can validate the accuracy of their circuit simulations and get race strategy models working early. This is important because pitlane length can influence race strategy. At the 2022 French GP, the pitlane exit boundary was extended two days before the race – as a consequence the cars had to remain at the speed limit for longer, turning what was expected to be a two-stop race into a one-stopper.

Once the teams built their simulator models, they could plan their drivers’ first taste of the Vegas track. The timings on this have varied across the grid: Ferrari, McLaren and Williams were among those holding Vegas-focused sim sessions between getting back from Japan and heading to Austin. Haas, meanwhile, opted to wait until after the Brazilian race because “the drivers aren’t going back to Europe [in the late 2023 triple-header] until after Brazil”, according to team boss Guenther Steiner.

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

There's been plenty of last-minute work to get the track completed

Surface tension

There are no restrictions on sending team staff to any new site ahead of a new event to try and gain knowledge of the true nature of a circuit’s surface. But in this case the roads the track is based upon are open to local traffic right through the build-up (aside from specific forecasted closures) and even on the race weekend. This made it tricky for the teams to take measurements ahead of the first event on the Strip.

When the track is locked down on the day before the first practice sessions take place – this will be done so the FIA and FOM staff can run through the usual track systems checks using the Safety and Medical cars – the teams will first have the chance to complete full track scans to assess surface roughness and joins, and capture accurate elevation changes. They have been supplied with estimations of the aggregate surface types (typically asphalt and stone) and the bitumen levels. But only the scans will reveal the true nature of the track surface.

“That combination of the track surface, which we know very little about the moment, and how that will interact with the tyres will dictate much of how the weekend pans out,” says Williams’ head of vehicle performance, Dave Robson. “One of the main things will be that we go
with a clear starting position, but that we also have a whole host of options lined up ready to cover whatever actually happens.”

"You need your hands to work well when you’re driving. So being on top of that is something we’re already looking into. Just simple things sometimes, with hand warmers and gloves and whatever" Lando Norris

Once the scans are in, the teams feed that data back to the factories and update their sim settings so dedicated drivers can sample how the track surface really is interacting with the Pirellis and in the confirmed event temperatures. But it’s understood that even at the very top teams, updating a simulator can take time – so there’s every chance the Vegas track scans are more valuable for 2024 than at the inaugural event on this layout. This will add to the jeopardy.

PLUS: Why Las Vegas is Ferrari's best chance to snare another 2023 F1 win from Red Bull

Track walks would aid drivers in understanding the real nuances of the new circuit. But there is no official time set aside for these in the current event timetable, due to the need to keep so many public roads open for as long as possible. Dodging traffic while inspecting the track would be even more disruptive than when Jeddah joined the calendar in 2021. There, as the drivers went out at night ahead of the first track sessions to avoid the blazing daytime sun, their inspections were regularly interrupted by pre-race event entertainment rehearsals that plunged another of F1’s fully lit circuits into random darkness.

But however the drivers are able to move about, Vegas is a city famously for its nightlife – something that has been enhanced in 2023. All through Turns 5-9, the track winds its way around the Sphere – the gone-viral concert venue opened in September. F1 has announced the Sphere will display “cued live” moments, including the real time pole position and a custom podium visual to celebrate the race winner, plus driver and fan content, while the colours yellow, red and blue have been banned which should avoid them thinking an incident has occurred ahead…

Photo by: Sam Bagnall / Motorsport Images

The Las Vegas sphere will provide a dramatic backdrop to the circuit

Desert chills

The other big talking point ahead of the
new race has been how Vegas’s November temperatures might impact car performance – again, specifically, the tyres. Some predictions have the mercury going as low as 4°C, although
other sources point to an event more closely matching the (still nippy) 2020 Eifel GP.

“[The temperature] will dictate largely how we are going to run qualifying, how are we going to run the car spec, etc,” says Haas’s trackside engineering director, Ayao Komatsu. He’s referring latterly to each car’s cooling vents, which would be expected to be closed in cold temperatures, with a drag-cutting benefit.

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But the drivers have another specific concern: how low temperatures will impact their bodies. Haas driver Nico Hulkenberg recalled winter testing at Barcelona in 2018, where snow stopped the track action. When things did get going, he recalled: “After a few laps your hands, your fingers, get so cold they’re kind of stuck in position and you lose feeling”.

“You need your hands to work well when you’re driving,” adds McLaren’s Lando Norris. “So being on top of that is something we’re already looking into. Just simple things sometimes, with hand warmers and gloves and whatever.”

Yet while the body’s outer extremities are the first to lose feeling in the cold, stable core temperature plays a major part too. Therefore, might drivers take to inflatable hot tubs for late-night session preparation rather than Singapore-style pre-race ice baths? In any case, this race’s late timetable will bring many references to the famed Singapore sleep schedule – albeit here lacking a handy time difference to the teams’ European basis to plan around.

“We’ll be going to bed super-late and waking up super-late,” says Williams driver Logan Sargeant. “If you don’t, you’ll be tired by the time qualifying comes around…”

Vegas might be the ‘Capital of Second Chances’, but F1 only has one shot at nailing what is surely its most eagerly anticipated new event of the Liberty Media years. No pressure, then…

Photo by: Erik Junius

The unusual schedule is set to be among the least of concerns for the inaugural event

What happens in Vegas…

After the Brazilian GP, the typical 2,000 metric tonnes of freight headed for Nevada and slotted into the triple-decked, 300,000 square foot, $500m paddock building Formula 1 has constructed under a mile from the Bellagio fountains. This will house the typical garage set-ups, as well as being open all year round. Talk of team hospitality units being over a mile away from the pits ended up wide of the mark thanks to F1’s land purchase for building the permanent paddock complex.

To get the approximately 2,000 paddock personnel in and out every day, let alone the thousands of corporate guests who are expected to sample this new race, three temporary vehicle bridges have been constructed, with one dedicated to serving the paddock only. This is aimed at getting the teams in smoothly and on time to create the spectacle for which F1 is longing. But the event is still predicted to create local traffic chaos – to avoid exacerbating the problem, F1 media were specifically warned not to book hire cars – so there are new considerations even for well-drilled team operations.

“We don’t know how we’re going to travel from A to B, from hotel to the track,” says Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff. “But I’m sure we’ll we’re going
to find solutions.”

“The racing is [on] late, but Vegas never sleeps! You can get anything at any time, so I think [the team staff] need a speech to keep them in check. But I’m pretty sure someone will be doing something stupid!” Guenther Steiner

“We’re quite excited,” adds Aston team principal, Mike Krack. “Vegas
itself – there will be a lot of distractions. It’s important to focus when it is the right moment.”

This raises another important question. In an entertainment-focused city catering to all manner of vices, how do the teams plan on keeping their staff focused on the competition?

“The racing is [on] late, but Vegas never sleeps!” says Haas team boss Guenther Steiner. “You can get anything at any time, so I think [the team staff] need a speech to keep them in check. But I’m pretty sure someone will be doing something stupid!”

Wolff, meanwhile, has a more solid,
if gently presented plan: “We’re going
to keep everybody out of the casinos.
I don’t play. So, I’m going to make
sure nobody plays!”

Photo by: Erik Junius

F1 teams hope to keep their staff in check around the temptations of the casinos