[WEC] BoP. Brilliant or Pants.

[Steve McQ]

Originally Posted by tomcug

https://sportscar365.com/lemans/wec/...r-bop-process/
Some interesting points:




So the question is - will the fastest LMH be as fast as the fastest LMDh at Qatar? Or slower? Or faster?

Basically we learn that what was sold to everyone as a BoP has shifted to a balance of results. No one signed for this.
Plus, they are adding criteria every 6 months and we have now cars running heavier than what they were designed for. Safety ? What is that ?
It was also told that no car could be selected for Le Mans alone because any car needed to be "BoPed" by racing before. Now, LM24 has a specific BoP that has nothing to do with the rest.

Looking like a headless chicken to me. Credibility of the process is running away, fast. If this is transparency, well I prefer it to be inpenetrable.

[Adam43]

It's almost like they are trying to tweak it to make it better.

[Steve McQ]

Better than what ? When does this chase stop ? This makes no sense at all.

[Adam43]

Better than the last iteration was. It never stops. It will always be able to be made better. Quite appropriate for a sport!

As with so much in the world it is about continual development. With any real world model you have to continually make it better. And in this situation you do it with others having input too, new cars, changes to cars, tracks, etc... all while managing several stakeholders.

Off topic, but there is a great race going on.

[J Jay]

Let's get in early - Porsche power drop/weight bump incoming.

[tomcug]

Since results are now taken into account, for sure.

[veeten]

Porsche will see an bump up, Toyota will get a reduction of 10-20kg, similar for a few others, Cadillac will stand pat, but yes there will be some evening out by the next two races.

[Adam43]

I think we've learnt something we've already knew!

Let's look at Ferrari BoP to Porsche BoP. Porsche gained 2kg v. Ferrari, but gained 2kW. So really no difference. Yet the relative performance has swung to Porsche.

Why could that be?

• Porsche had a good development winter. The potential was there.
• Penske sorted themselves out a bit. They were the best team here, but not at the last race
• Different tracks, different performance.

Interesting things to consider, or comedy theories, when thinking about BoP:

• Last year the Porsche wasn't BoPped right and that was carried forward into this year. It is hard to detect true potential.
• The spread of the Porsche teams shows that team makes a difference. It covers a lot of the Hypercar spread. This is a good thing that team can make such a difference. But is a huge challenge for us judging the BoP.
• The new to WEC teams are close, but towards the bottom. The ACO will need to be careful here, as it could mean they are like Porsche last year.
  The team with least resources, least testing, and reliability problems is also the slowest. But it was still a good early start I think.

On the interesting points from tomcug's post and link https://sportscar365.com/lemans/wec/...r-bop-process/
I think there are some good tweaks there.

• Not having knee jerk reactions, but moving slowly with changes is good.
• Stating the LMDh and Hypercar equivalency is good (although sort of just emphasising what we had).
• Including more results weighting in the BoP I am not keen on. Although maybe this is something that does help with the Porsche improvement from above and just accepting of how hard it it. Or that it is accepting that fans can't get their heads round how you can have two cars that are well balanced but only one wins!
• Having Le Mans separate is just being pragmatic about it all. That doesn't mean that it isn't sensible to still maintain the rule you have to have done other races first. They still need some data.

• And to my previous point. I look forward to the next changes in weight, power, energy, FWD activation with interest.
• I look forward to the Power gain after 210 kph adjustment. I think that might be quite a smart thing to do.
• I also look forward to the next tweak in approach as this continues to be honed.

Mostly I look forward to the next race.

[Enduranceracer]

I am a diehard Porsche fan and extremely happy with the results but yes there has to be some slight tweeking. The thing that there was absolutely no chance of 4 LMDh's finishing in the top 4 last year is a big deal. It is good to see that WEC/ACO have made some changes. It should give BMW Lambo and Alpine some hope that they have a chance. Porsche had the best data/setup for the unique Qatar tire deg. and that led to an overall strong performance all week. Imola is a completely different circuit so let's see what Rd. 2 brings. Before that lets enjoy Sebring (IMSA) in two weeks with Porsche ,Cadillac, Acura, BMW and Lambo. I am sure it is gonna be a good one!!!

[Steve McQ]

All of this comes from the fact the ACO were not patient enough with the very first system trying to balance fully developped cars (well the GR010) and extremely well rehearsed teams (well the one there for ten years of course) with newcomers.


Now they are prisoners of their own logic with a view on balancing every car, every team on every track. To do that, the BoP process gets even more complicated, but it will never achieve what it is designed for. All the cars are different (whatever the BoP does), teams and cars progress at different rates etc... Today we saw Proton lagging behind Penske and Jota with the same car. What if Penske and Jota were "Protons" last year, unable to exctract potential from the car ? Over reacting to several cars and teams difficulties last year threw away any chance of having a sensible long term BoP process. It has become GT3esque very quickly, and will never recover, whatever new features get add-in.

[Adam43]

By the same logic, after one race we cannot tell.

Originally Posted by Steve McQ

All of this comes from the fact the ACO were not patient enough with the very first system trying to balance fully developped cars (well the GR010) and extremely well rehearsed teams (well the one there for ten years of course) with newcomers.

But they hardly made any changes v. the last race last year. https://tentenths.com/forum/showpost...&postcount=747
They are patient and indeed one of the tweaks you mention is to state they will make any future changes slowly. They must be listening to you!

Perhaps Penske developed into the most extremely well rehearsed team now and we are just perfectly balanced.

Now they are prisoners of their own logic with a view on balancing every car, every team on every track. To do that, the BoP process gets even more complicated, but it will never achieve what it is designed for. All the cars are different (whatever the BoP does), teams and cars progress at different rates etc...

Er yes, that is the whole point. We have a series that still allows teams to have a technical influence. And have loads of teams. And all quite close. From that is it already achieving exactly what it is designed for!

If you are suggesting that it is designed to make every car exactly the same performance then no it won't ever be perfect. Although it is damn close - there are single make series with more variation. Not that this is what it is designed for.

But to help overall they need to develop the method and keep collecting the data. This is standard practice with any method, model, or approach across practically any industry.

Today we saw Proton lagging behind Penske and Jota with the same car. What if Penske and Jota were "Protons" last year, unable to exctract potential from the car ? Over reacting to several cars and teams difficulties last year threw away any chance of having a sensible long term BoP process.

Exactly. So are we just seeing that another team did a better job. It's working!

It ... will never recover ...

What are we recovering from?

[Adam43]

Although my main point it that we can’t tell. Other than it is pretty close out there. And there are some certain themes that are pleasing to see, such as experience helps, driver and team variations are > magnitude than BoP variations, and things that make endurance racing what it is like tyre management and strategy are still in the series.

[Steve McQ]

We can't tell, but we could have. So sad.

[Adam43]

How could we tell? How can anyone tell!?

The uncertainties in the measurement are too great.

[TF110]

I have said it before that the new teams needed time to come good. Thats what I think has happened. Porsche I think has made the most strides because they have the most cars therefore the most data. I think they should have left the bop alone from the end of last year. The cars running as-is from the last race in Bahrain. I think that should have happened and then see how this race turned out. Too late now so lets see what happens for Imola.

[Adam43]

Originally Posted by TF110

I think they should have left the bop alone from the end of last year. The cars running as-is from the last race in Bahrain.

The changes weren’t that big. Especially when ypu look at the Ferrari and Porsche.

The big change is that Porsche and particularly Penske improved. Could be Qatar, but probably it is an underlying improvement as Daytona suggested too.

[J Jay]

A post-race comment that might be useful in determining Toyota's BoP for Imola:

Originally Posted by Andre Lotterer

“It’s the most weight sensitive track of the season, so even though Toyota performed so well in Qualifying, they struggled here,” Lotterer told DSC when asked if he was surprised by the Japanese team’s lack of form.

So a weight loss is likely, but perhaps smaller than the pace at Losail may have indicated.

Ferrari's pace was also quite close to Cadillac (who were very close to Porsche/Peugeot), the time was lost for all three cars due to incidents.

[veeten]

So, outside of incidents on track and mistakes in the pit, the field is more closer to each other than previously. The four new entrants, one crossing over from a series that shares rules, another returning after building their new charge, and two others that are unknown to this level of racing as a competitor, not just a supporter.

Once again, for the newcomers, it will take time for them to get their footing.

That's the thing about this BoP, it has the ability to make the sport more stable and welcome new entrants as time and spaces allow.

[Matador]

Toyota (Benchmark team, 12 years experience, well developed car) on top, "BoP bad!!!"


Porsche podium sweep, 5/top 10, "Let's wait a minute, here they are still tweaking"


FFS. Let's admit they (ACO/FIA) did and are fk'ing up. They are so anxious to embrace farcical stories/fairy tales and contrived entertainment for the flashy brands that they hurriedly nerfed Toyota into oblivion instead of doing what they should/could have done and use it as a litmus test to gauge the development of the other teams and cars. The newer manufacturers were never going to stand still. Why punish the guys who've been putting in the hard work and have been the glue that held the WEC together for us to get to this point? I'm sure Toyota relish the competition and the opportunity to close the mouths of the detractors who continually claim their achievements amount to naught but lets be for real here. The amount of times Toyota have had to change and update design specs to make the cars suit the current iteration of the regs, only for the ACO/FIA to LITERALLY rewrite the regs to be able to add more ballast and push the tyres into an unsafe envelope is patently ridiculous.


Lets see what Imola and Spa bring to the table.

[Adam43]

Man, I don’t see how bad it had become and how dramatically awful it was. I mean FFS!

I have to hand it to you as I could not see any of that. When I look at the times of the cars and the BoP adjustments I’m not CLEVER enough to deduce any of that.

I’d be wrong to suggest that if the Bahrain and Qatar results were the other way round you could practically write the same thing.

To me it looked like the natural variations of circuit, tyres, drivers, teams was much greater than the spread of the cars. I just, NAIVELY, thought that meant that getting it perfect would be really hard and that to get everything so close was a job well done. Especially while attracting so many entrants.

I recon that the changes we see for Imola and Spa will support your theory perfectly.

[V8 Fireworks]

Originally Posted by Adam43

It's almost like they are trying to tweak it to make it better.

Better = Toyota don't win even though they are the best?

Seems like a joke. For Toyota to be a lap down in Qatar with the best car is ridiculous.

I have to say this seems like WEC and Le Mans 24 hour with zero credibility.

It makes the championship unwatchable. Even worse than IMSA!

Originally Posted by Adam43

When I look at the times of the cars and the BoP adjustments I’m not CLEVER enough to deduce any of that.

The Toyota is the best car and they finished a lap down beaten even by lowly two-wheel-drive LMDh cars?

Originally Posted by Adam43

I just, NAIVELY, thought that meant that getting it perfect would be really hard and that to get everything so close was a job well done.

Robbing Toyota of race victories and giving them to Porsche is a job well done? That's even worse than robbing Acura of a Daytona 24 hour victory (or some kind of chance), at least they were on the lead lap...

[V8 Fireworks]

Originally Posted by Adam43

Better than the last iteration was. It never stops. It will always be able to be made better. Quite appropriate for a sport!

Formula One and MotoGP are a sport. This is a nonsense.

[Adam43]

Thanks for bolding things otherwise I wouldn’t have understood what you said. Perhaps I should have bolded things in my post so you understood what I meant. Or did you decide to just infer other things from my post anyway rather than make an effort to understand my point?

What is good is that there are options of what to watch.

But crikey there is a lot of anger here. Again, I am amazed that everyone can be so categorically sure about things here.

I’ll calm down on the sarcasm if we can calm down on the hyperbole, swearing and hating about something that is frankly not that important. I am failing to take it all that seriously.

All I’ve actually said is that it is close out there, it is hard to do this stuff, and it is practically impossible to get it better than it is. I’m interested in how it works, how it is working, and the current pecking order. I consider these things.

[tomcug]

Originally Posted by Adam43

Thanks for bolding things otherwise I wouldn’t have understood what you said.

This and some like to repeat themselves like a broken record in this thread

[V8 Fireworks]

Originally Posted by Adam43

But crikey there is a lot of anger here. Again, I am amazed that everyone can be so categorically sure about things here.

You are welcome to support BOP if you like, but F1, MotoGP and WRC are clearly better as engineering competitions IMO, it is no contest!

To render IMSA and WEC unwatchable is on the organisers and their decisions. BOP shouldn't manipulate who wins the race. To put so much weight on some cars is just absurd IMO.

Originally Posted by tomcug

This and some like to repeat themselves like a broken record in this thread

Those defending BOP, despite it being pants IMO, are not a broken record too?

BOP is necessary in GT3. It should not be necessary in prototype classes -- be it MotoGP, Formula One or LMP. Unlike GT3 cars that are different, LMP cars are all more or less the same (unless you choose LMDh because you are too cheap).