Dear Nissan, Different Doesn't Always Mean Better

I'll be honest, I'm not a huge Nissan fan, but I might be a GTR LMP1 fan.  I'm kind of a sucker for weird, slow, race cars.  While few people would disagree with me that no one is going to confuse the Nissan with any other car in the paddock, some people might be claiming that it is too early to say that the GTR LMP1 is going to get it's lunch money stolen by Audi, Porsche and Toyota.  Those people don't read racing news.

Thing's haven't been going well for Nissan lately.  The exceptional Mulsanne's Corner has been following and speculating on the development of the GTR LMP1 since the beginning of the project.  The latest news from the guys over at Mulsanne's is that Nissan will not be racing either at the WEC season opener at Silverstone, or the following race at Spa.  The reason for this is that Nissan failed their FIA crash test.  Specifically, they need to have the car homologated 30 days before they can race it.  This puts Silverstone completely out of the question, and Spa (if Nissan had chosen to run Spa), extremely difficult.  That means that the car will make it's debut at Le Mans.  In addition to the Nissan's shake down run being the most important race on the calendar, Nissan has limited testing miles under their belt.  According to the cover story in the March issue of Racecar Engineering, Nissan has only 2,000 kilometers of testing on the car, compared to 40,000 kilometers of testing that Toyota had when they debuted their car.  Unconventional car, limited testing, and late debut to the race season, I don't possibly see anything that could go wrong here.

Of course, if the Nissan could live up to the car's original billing, then they still might be a force to be reckoned with.  According to RACER's March cover story however, Nissan has slowly been adjusting everyone's expectations downward.  Originally, Nissan was shooting for 2,000 horse power with all wheel drive (internal combustion engine driving the front wheels and hybrid drive system driving the back wheels).  This has been adjusted downwards to 1,250 horsepower.  Also troubling is that originally the car was supposed to run in the 8MJ hybrid subclass, but Nissan is now anticipating running in the 4MJ or even 2MJ subclass.  The speed comparison of the 2MJ Audi to the 6MJ Toyota and Porsche last year showed that when it comes to hybrid LMP1 cars, you want all the megajoules you can get.  But wait, it gets worse.  Nissan designed the original concept of the car assuming an 8MJ hybrid system driving the rear wheels.  With the smaller hybrid system, Nissan has decided to lighten the car by getting rid of the heavy drivelines that send power to the back wheels and send all of the power to the front wheels.  You read that right.  The GTR LMP1, Nissan's flagship racing car, is front wheel drive.  Just like an Altima.  Nissan claims that they feel they can make this concept work with a combination of high downforce (which is Nissan is to be believed is the car's true strength), and advanced traction control.  Personally I'm still not buying it.  Nissan is asking the front tires to do all of the work, and no matter how advanced the engineering, there are certain laws of physics that Nissan can't change.  

Racecar Engineering reported that the GTR is running sub-two minute lap times at Circuit of the Americas.  Pole time at COTA last year was 1:49.  Depending on what is mean't by "sub 2 minutes" Nissan could either be a few seconds of the pace (still significant), to almost ten seconds off the pace. Either way, they have work to do.

To be fair, lots of cars have significant issues their first year, but with Nissan it seams like the hits just keep on coming. If Nissan can build a car that matches the GTR LMP1's original specifications, they will have a car that is the class of the field.  The real question is can they sort out the car's problems before Nissan decides to cut their losses. 

Best Super Bowl Commercial Ever?

So did you see Nissan's Super Bowl commercial?  You know, this one.  The one with all the race cars.  If you haven't heard why this is a big deal already (and if you haven't, what WEC hating rock have you been living under), it's because this is the official unveiling of Nissan's new LMP1 car.

RACER has a four page write up on the new car here.  I'm still digesting all the information that's come out in the last couple of hours (ie, it's Sunday night and I'm getting ready for work on Monday), but even based a cursory glance, this car is...interesting.  First, it's front engine, like the old ALMS Panoz prototypes (technically the car is mid engine, it just puts the engine in front of the driver, instead of behind the driver like every other mid engine car).  Second, the car uses a five speed transmission.  Let's just sit and marvel at those last couple of sentences for a second.  Modern F1 cars all have eight speed gearboxes.  Furthermore, A front engine car hasn't won an F1 race since 1960, while the last front engine car to win the Indianapolis 500 was 1964.  A front engine car with a five speed transmission sounds like it should run on coal.

Now make sure your sitting down for this next part, because after you get passed the engine and the gearbox, things start getting really weird.  This car is front wheel drive.  Okay, that part is actually a bit of lie (sort of).  Like all modern LMP1 prototypes, the Nissan is a hybrid (seriously, why are you listening to me say this, go read that RACER article, they're smarter then I am).  The power from the car's internal combustion engine goes to the front wheels, while the electric power can go to either the front or the rear wheels.  This means that the car can be run as an AWD car, but here's where things start getting confusing.  Although the design of the car allows it to be run in an AWD fashion, Nissan can run it as a strict FWD car, if they choose.  It's not particularly clear at this time if car is actually FWD, AWD or some weird crime-against-nature combination of the two.  So, if this is all as clear as mud for you, good, we're on the same page.  In all honestly, these guys are shooting for a car with somewhere between 1,250 and 1,500 horse power.  Does anyone honestly think that the engineers are going to try and send all that power through the front wheels, and let the rear wheels just chill out and do nothing?  I can't help but think that when Nissan goes to race this thing, some amount of power is going to be sent to the back wheels.

As I understand it, Nissan plans on campaigning the car this year in the World in Endurance Championship.  When this thing shows up for the first race, there's no doubt it's going to be the most interesting thing on the grid.  Which is what worries me.  Sometimes, guys who innovate and try something new go on to curb stomp the competition.  The other possibility (which I think is the more realistic scenario for the 2015 season) is that Audi, Toyota and Porsche focus on the business of winning races, while Nissan sits in the garage trying to figure out what's wrong with their Rube Goldberg Machine of a drivetrain today.  The point I'm driving at is that Nissan deliberately built this thing so that it would be completely different from anything else currently on the grid.  Judging on that criteria, mission accomplished Nissan, but building something completely different, just because you can, isn't necessarily the best way to build a race car.  Don't believe me?  Allow me to present exhibit A, the Delta Wing.

My Johnny Rain Cloud analysis aside, I'm really looking forward to seeing this car on the track.  I'm planning on heading down to Austin this September for the WEC race at Circuit of the Americas, so hopefully we'll have some exclusive out of focus pictures of Nissan's brand new LMP1 car on The Racing Nerd before the year is out.