Is drifting really faster?

[banpei]

El_Camino Wrote:Banpei, exactly this is the question - where is the limit! And its not important for one lap or a whole race - its about the principle.
If drifting can be fast driving, and and as you are saying, they are saving tires, then it would be often (or at least sometimes) happening, that Schumacher or Frenzen would allow themselves to go drifting, just to overtake somebody in a very very important turn. Or maybe at the last lap of the race everybody will be drifting, because no need to save tires?
No - thats not the case. Nobody is even thinking about it ... and this is why I'm still doubting that there is a way to go faster sliding.

I agree with you on one point: in a normal F1/DTM/etc. race it is of no importance and all corners are not worth drifting through and even if there was a corner which is worth drifting through they simply wouldn't because their tires are calculated for a certain distance and extra pitstops (in case they would have unlimited supply of tires) would require extra time. In such races it just does not make sense.

On the other hand Alesi ruled the wet-races because of his ability to keep the F1 car on track while drifting/sliding through the tight corners and gripping in the big corners. In wet circumstances the tire-factor counts less and the F1 car is already having a hard time finding enough grip to stay on track.

But there are much more factors which determine why people would not drift in a race: the car itself (F1 cars are unsuitable), concentration (endurance), extra fuel consumption and the risk-factor (a F1 car is already hard to handle).