Caterham wants to continue its learning in China

The Chinese Grand Prix is only the third race of the season, and all teams know very well that their cars are still improvable, which is particularly the case at Caterham, as Mark Smith, the technical director, admitted: As we head to Shanghai for the third race of 2012, we know that we still have room to work to extract the best from the car and the tires both in qualifying and the race. We have studied this in detail since our return from Malaysia, and we have some plans to put in place to help us move forward as soon as we are on track in Shanghai.

As Heikki Kovalainen explains, the Shanghai International Circuit is not a complicated track for drivers as long as their car is properly set up: The circuit is a mix of low and medium-speed corners, there is a very long straight with a tight turn at the end that offers a natural overtaking point, and some complex tight turns that you feel like you never take correctly. It’s not too hard on the brakes, but you need a stable car during braking to attack in all braking zones, and you need good traction to handle the slow corners well.

His Russian teammate, Vitaly Petrov, shares the same opinion: « It is not a particularly difficult circuit to drive, it is not too technical, but you need to ensure you take the tight sections from turns 1 to 4 and from 11 to 13 well because they lead you onto the straight. You can gain or lose quite a bit of time in these two sequences, and that means setting up the cars well to have a good balance between the high-speed sequence up to turn 14, where you need little downforce, and the slower turns in sectors 1 and 3, where you need more aerodynamic downforce. »

Overtaking is not necessarily easy in China despite a long straight, and one must take advantage of the corners preceding this straight to position well and attempt something according to Kovalainen: The key is probably the sequence of turns 11, 12, and 13 – you need to make sure to brake well at 11 to maintain maximum speed through turns 12 and 13 and approach the straight correctly. Doing this well gives you a chance to fight at the end of the straight.

Mark Smith agrees with his driver, even though he believes that the contribution of KERS could be beneficial for Caterham this season: The ambient temperatures in China are always lower than during the last race in Malaysia, even if it wouldn’t be surprising to see rain appear at times throughout the weekend. The layout of the circuit makes overtaking difficult, so it will be interesting to see how KERS can assist us, as it will be the first time we have it there, in addition to DRS this year.

With the possibility of rain appearing in Shanghai, teams will do their utmost to conduct their testing on dry track during free practice sessions if possible. For Caterham, these tests will focus on learning about the new Pirelli tires: The track surface is relatively smooth and curbs are generally not a problem in China, so we will take that into account when planning the optimum settings for the weekend. We haven’t had a completely dry race in 2012 yet, which means we have limited information on the tires before this weekend’s Chinese Grand Prix. This places very high importance on the tire testing programs during free practice 1 and 2 and gives the engineers a lot of work to do on Friday night.

To best prepare for the start of the season, the Malaysian team has worked tirelessly during these few weeks of “break” since the Malaysian Grand Prix, as the team boss, Tony Fernandes, stated: “The pace of work at the factory has intensified because we continue the development race. At this time last year, we wanted to bring innovations to each race, but we weren’t in a financial or logistical position to do so. This year, we can do it, and that is another sign that we are going in the right direction.”

Caterham knows where it stands compared to its rivals and it is not yet what it completely hoped for, but Fernandes stated that the engineers know in which areas progress is possible: «Before the races in Australia and Malaysia, we had a very clear idea of where we would be compared to the other teams around us, and the performances glimpsed confirmed that we need to continue to close the gap with the teams ahead of us. Over race weekends, we need to study how to improve our race pace, and it seems that we can also work to more effectively maximize our performance levels with the tires.»

The Malaysian team principal also revealed that in order to get closer to the midfield pack, the team will be introducing some aerodynamic updates to try to improve the performance of the CT01: «At the factory, our main objective is to work on enhancing the aerodynamic performance of the cars. This is to give us the chance to fight for the point we aim to grab, and the fact that we are approaching the next two races outside Europe with upgrades we could only dream of last season is a very encouraging sign that shows just how hard everyone in the team is working to help us achieve our goals.»

Aerodynamics is an important factor in China, and Mark Smith believes that new parts could provide a significant performance gain: « We will run both of our cars in configurations with a lot of downforce, and we will have new bodywork elements to increase downforce and make cooling more efficient, given the low temperatures we will encounter in Shanghai. China is not particularly hard on brakes, but we will have some new developments in this area. »

Vitaly Petrov has raced twice at the Shanghai International Circuit and each time he finished in the points. Even though he dreams of repeating this performance in 2012, he knows it will be complicated although new developments are planned: «I have finished in the points in the last two years in Shanghai and while it would obviously be great to repeat that in 2012 with Caterham, I think it is still a bit too early in the season for us to score a point in China.»