Sportscar Engineering

Sebring saw a heavy-handed shift in Balance of Performance, something still rather new to the top class of the world championship. Despite seeing some races with remarkably similar average lap times, the previous season only one chassis winning races, the Toyota GR010, highlighting how poor over a race distance the system was implemented. Previously we have explored why this is happening, how the Alpine cannot fit the fuel energy it is given in the BoP in the car, and proposed options for the series to improve the racing. So, how did Alpine turn it around with such a win?! BoP Baseline Changes It appeared leading up to the race that these calls for action from last season were heeded; Toyota had their GR010s with 30kg added, and 11MegaJoules removed from the stint energy allowance since last season as the baseline Balance of Performance. But much more importantly their hybrid system couldn’t be deployed below 190kph – previously it was 120kph (in dry and 150 for wet tyre running). This