F1 2021 Launch Dates and reveal

Can't wait for Ferrari's annual promises of 'improvement, faster, bla bla bla...'

 

Williams has completed a maiden run-out with its new FW43B Formula 1 car ahead of the 2021 season by holding a shakedown at Silverstone on Wednesday.

Williams announced earlier this month that it would launch its new car for the coming season on 5 March, but has opted to give it a first on-track test prior to its unveiling.

In a teaser video posted to social media on Wednesday, Williams showed the FW43B car running at Silverstone in damp conditions, making it the second team known to have conducted a shakedown with its 2021 car.

McLaren held a shakedown with its 2021 car at Silverstone on Tuesday after unveiling the MCL35M model one day earlier.

Nicholas Latifi was shown watching F1 team-mate George Russell testing the car, with teams limited to just 100km of running under the filming day regulations, or equivalent to 17 laps of the Silverstone circuit.

Although the car was blurred, it appeared to be running in a dark livery, straying away from the white design that was raced with last year. Williams has previously used a navy blue livery through pre-season before launching its race design for the start of the season.

One step closer. 05.03.21. #FW43B pic.twitter.com/NhHDOx5gsD

— Williams Racing (@WilliamsRacing) February 17, 2021
This year's campaign will mark Williams' first full season under new ownership after the team was acquired by US investment fund Dorilton Capital last August, leading to the departure of the Williams family.

Despite the exit of founder and team principal Sir Frank Williams, the team has opted to maintain his initials in the car name, sticking to the tradition that has been present since it was founded.

Williams is one of three teams that has opted to update their 2020 car nomenclature, adding the 'B' designation to the FW43 that raced last year to reflect the freeze in the majority of development under the new rules.

The British squad will enter the new season looking to build on a 2020 campaign during which it made considerable progress in terms of relative pace, regularly competing with the Haas and Alfa Romeo teams after a year cut adrift in 2019.

Besides Williams' teaser on Wednesday, Alfa Romeo also began to stir up interest ahead of the launch of its C41 car on 22 February, posting a shadowy image of the chassis with the teaser "not long till we get to meet you".

 

Pirelli has announced its compound choices for the 2021 Formula 1 season, with its selection broadly in line with last year's approach.

While in the past Pirelli has decided on its tyre choices a few weeks in advance of races, it has elected to plan out the entire campaign for 2021 because of ongoing complications caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

Pirelli's head of F1 and car racing Mario Isola said: "Announcing all the selections for the year right now will help the teams and the drivers with their planning, also allowing for maximum flexibility just in case the calendar has to change due to Covid-19 restrictions, as we saw last year."

While Pirelli brings a soft, medium and hard to every race, the actual compound selection does vary track to track.

For 2021, the compounds are pretty much aligned with what's been used in the past - although softer rubber will be taken to Baku and Brazil.

Isola added: "The selections themselves are on the whole similar to last year (or 2019, in the case of races not run in 2020), which means that teams should have plenty of data to fall back on - but we have two races where the nominations are softer.

"The first is Azerbaijan, where our C2 hard tyre wasn't used last time, so we are now going with the softest selection of all: C3, C4 and C5.

"Then we have Brazil, where we will take the C2, C3 and C4 this year, as the C1 that was selected as the hardest choice last time didn't show a particularly big advantage in terms of wear over the medium.

"In both cases, the softer nomination could lead to a greater variety of race strategies".

With F1 continuing to use different protocols because of covid, the forthcoming campaign will be another one where every driver is given the same allocation of tyre sets each weekend.

Previously, teams could nominate a varied selection for their drivers depending on how aggressive or conservative they wanted to be.

Just like last year though drivers will all have the same sets available at the start of the weekend, which will be two hards, three mediums and eight softs.

While the selections have been laid out now, there is scope within the regulations for the choices to be changed in exceptional circumstances up to 15 days before an event starts.

Full Pirelli tyre selection for 2021
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https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/155118/pirelli-unveils-tyre-choices-for-2021

 

Alphatauri Asian boy band driver. Hope he's fast

 

(Forget it. Just read the site in its entirety. The car launch is still March 10. Still seems bizarre to have a separate "team launch")

Just received an e-mail regarding Ferrari "Team Launch" on February 26.

Is this the new car reveal date? How in the world would you do a "team launch" without revealing your new car??

Kevin

 

Alpha Tauri car looks good.

monochromatic blues except the only red logo Honda...

Robb

 

Alfa:

https://streamable.com/2mkkdn

 

Link to the youtube presentation of the car LIVE: Alfa Romeo Reveal Their 2021 Car: The C41 - YouTube

 

That hump in the back makes me think of difficult packaging for the new Ferrari engine.

 

Correction to above message: after checking pics of last years´ AlfaSauber, the hump in the back is almost the same, so it´s not related to the engine.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CLl8uv4g5_F/?utm_source=ig_embed

 

They used their two tokens to change the nose and alter the front suspension. Ferrari not expected to use any tokens at the front but hopefully their crash structure allows some refinement to their nose design. By refinement I mean less ugly

Sauber says they recycled the whole back end—gearbox, suspension, etc. Not sure if they used, like Haas, the Ferrari back end though we didn’t hear they had issues there last year.

They also recycled the radiators so don’t expect big changes at the back. The only notable change is the cooling outlet shape which looks to have been raised away from the top of the diffuser a bit.

Alfa already had a different cooling scheme to Ferrari with the “ears” behind the roll hoop—and what Ferrari seems to have moved to this year—so presumably Alfa are happy with the efficiency of their cooling system.

 

With a few comments:

https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/155168/red-bull-reveals-rb16b-car-ahead-of-f1-2021-season

 

I had to look up his height. I really thought he'd be (well) below 1.50m....he's actually taller than Heidfeld/Massa. An Engineers' dream, that's for sure.