F1 engineer signals key Verstappen difference to rival drivers
From the world of sim racing, growing into Formula 1 – it’s
something that many young racing talents have in mind. Whether it
will ever come to pass remains to be seen, because the road to F1
is one full of obstacles. Not only for drivers, but also for other
employees at teams in the premier class of motorsport. Atze
Kerkhof, a driver performance consultant at Stake F1 is an example
of what the road towards the pinnacle of motorsport can look like.
The Dutchman showed that you can make it to Formula 1 from sim
racing as a driver performance consultant. In an exclusive
interview, RacingNews365 asked Kerkhof exactly what his role at
Stake F1 looks like: “The setup and driving determine the vehicle
dynamics. “That’s about how a car moves, how you create the optimal
grip with your accelerator and brake pedals, the steering wheel and
your gears. “To bring all that together is like tightrope walking,
where the balance has to be absolutely perfect to get through the
corner in the best possible way. “Everything I’ve learned during my
career in elite sports, sim racing and the engineer’s part makes me
understand the car, but even more so how a driver can have the
optimal grip every time. “After all, you have to have the grip in
the car with a fluid movement, instead of moving the car like crazy
which only slows it down.” That fluidity, and how responsive the
car has been, is something that is often named by drivers after the
various sessions. In particular, former drivers express their
admiration for how today’s Formula 1 drivers steer in a fluid,
flowing motion. “This fluid style is actually very unnatural for a
lot of drivers. When you tell drivers to push, they actually start
working harder in the car,” Kerkhof explains. “That way you end up
just driving slower. “That is the piece of vehicle dynamics where
everything comes together and where you have to understand and be
able to imagine how to get the most out of the car. “You have to
take all the data, a lot of it is reflected in the telemetry, and
from there you can paint a picture about how to tell the driver how
to drive. “So you’re always looking for which driving style
provides the most grip. Maybe that style may seem less fast to a
driver sometimes, but the advised way is ultimately the fastest way
to finish the lap, also because you’re using the tires optimally.
To make that happen, however, you have to get a lot of people
moving in the same direction.” The feedback challenge Nevertheless,
convincing a driver is still not easy. Although, there are also
drivers who mainly give the feedback to the engineers themselves
rather than the other way around. “In any sport and with any
athlete, of course, giving feedback is difficult,” Kerkhof stated.
“It should cause an athlete to do something different because it
would be better. However, that goes against the driver’s ego. “So
that’s already difficult, because you have to be able to explain
something very well. You have to be able to point that out really
clearly, with different tools like actual data. Otherwise the
driver doesn’t pick it up. “The next step is whether the driver can
also change his driving style. You have to keep working on that
over and over again and that is a long process. “However, everyone
knows that you can always find two or three-tenths and just look
what a difference that makes in qualifying in 2024. “All drivers
are under pressure right now because of the current driver market
and so they know how important it is to find just that half-tenth
in qualifying, so starting from the first free practice, we also
have to work on being as efficient as possible. You have to go in
the right direction as soon as possible, to get the whole picture
of the set-up right. “In the team’s factory, during such a race
weekend, a lot is collected in terms of data and the conclusion of
that is used to find another better set-up the next day. “You have
three aspects, the set-up of the engineers, driving tools of the
performance engineer [who provide input per corner about what the
driver needs to change in order to be more stable and faster
through the corner] and the driver part. “You have to bring those
three aspects together. My role is to go in one direction with all
three together, and thus bring synergy to the whole picture. “That
process goes in three steps. What does the driver have to do? How
is the car going to respond to that or what do we need from the
car? And ultimately, how can we bring this together? Those are the
three steps in the process.” Although it is a process that is easy
to describe, it is not necessarily so easy to perfectly execute.
“You are dealing with multiple insights and also every driver is
different,” he added. “So you have to adjust the process with each
driver as well. “Every driver has his own approach and that’s why
it varies a lot from one driver to the next on what a process looks
like.” Working with Max Verstappen Prior to joining Sauber at the
behest of Xevi Pujolar, Max Verstappen’s former race engineer,
Kerkhof started out doing competitive sim racing. That led to the
opportunities at feeder category team Van Amersfoort Racing, where
the Red Bull driver was part of the set up. The pair worked
together, with Kerkhof tasked with setting benchmark times for the
young drivers to match. Eventually, Verstappen was brought into the
fold at sim racing outfit Team Redline, where Kerkhof already was
and remains to this day with his compatriot. “When I look at Max
Verstappen on the current grid, for example, he has a 99% feel for
what he needs and knows how to indicate what needs to be done,”
Kerkhof said of the three-time F1 drivers’ champion. “He is very
easy to do that and that is why he is a very easy person to work
with for a team. “After all, they just have to do what he wants and
then it will work out. That is not true for every driver and then
sometimes some friction arises between the driver and the team.
“During race weekends where one experiences a bad free practice at
a team, you see that reflected in the fact that someone like
Verstappen manages to steer the team in the right direction in the
end. “So that’s where some drivers differ from each other as well,
because for many drivers it’s the other way around. They need the
engineers’ input more instead of being able to give the engineers
the right input.”
something that many young racing talents have in mind. Whether it
will ever come to pass remains to be seen, because the road to F1
is one full of obstacles. Not only for drivers, but also for other
employees at teams in the premier class of motorsport. Atze
Kerkhof, a driver performance consultant at Stake F1 is an example
of what the road towards the pinnacle of motorsport can look like.
The Dutchman showed that you can make it to Formula 1 from sim
racing as a driver performance consultant. In an exclusive
interview, RacingNews365 asked Kerkhof exactly what his role at
Stake F1 looks like: “The setup and driving determine the vehicle
dynamics. “That’s about how a car moves, how you create the optimal
grip with your accelerator and brake pedals, the steering wheel and
your gears. “To bring all that together is like tightrope walking,
where the balance has to be absolutely perfect to get through the
corner in the best possible way. “Everything I’ve learned during my
career in elite sports, sim racing and the engineer’s part makes me
understand the car, but even more so how a driver can have the
optimal grip every time. “After all, you have to have the grip in
the car with a fluid movement, instead of moving the car like crazy
which only slows it down.” That fluidity, and how responsive the
car has been, is something that is often named by drivers after the
various sessions. In particular, former drivers express their
admiration for how today’s Formula 1 drivers steer in a fluid,
flowing motion. “This fluid style is actually very unnatural for a
lot of drivers. When you tell drivers to push, they actually start
working harder in the car,” Kerkhof explains. “That way you end up
just driving slower. “That is the piece of vehicle dynamics where
everything comes together and where you have to understand and be
able to imagine how to get the most out of the car. “You have to
take all the data, a lot of it is reflected in the telemetry, and
from there you can paint a picture about how to tell the driver how
to drive. “So you’re always looking for which driving style
provides the most grip. Maybe that style may seem less fast to a
driver sometimes, but the advised way is ultimately the fastest way
to finish the lap, also because you’re using the tires optimally.
To make that happen, however, you have to get a lot of people
moving in the same direction.” The feedback challenge Nevertheless,
convincing a driver is still not easy. Although, there are also
drivers who mainly give the feedback to the engineers themselves
rather than the other way around. “In any sport and with any
athlete, of course, giving feedback is difficult,” Kerkhof stated.
“It should cause an athlete to do something different because it
would be better. However, that goes against the driver’s ego. “So
that’s already difficult, because you have to be able to explain
something very well. You have to be able to point that out really
clearly, with different tools like actual data. Otherwise the
driver doesn’t pick it up. “The next step is whether the driver can
also change his driving style. You have to keep working on that
over and over again and that is a long process. “However, everyone
knows that you can always find two or three-tenths and just look
what a difference that makes in qualifying in 2024. “All drivers
are under pressure right now because of the current driver market
and so they know how important it is to find just that half-tenth
in qualifying, so starting from the first free practice, we also
have to work on being as efficient as possible. You have to go in
the right direction as soon as possible, to get the whole picture
of the set-up right. “In the team’s factory, during such a race
weekend, a lot is collected in terms of data and the conclusion of
that is used to find another better set-up the next day. “You have
three aspects, the set-up of the engineers, driving tools of the
performance engineer [who provide input per corner about what the
driver needs to change in order to be more stable and faster
through the corner] and the driver part. “You have to bring those
three aspects together. My role is to go in one direction with all
three together, and thus bring synergy to the whole picture. “That
process goes in three steps. What does the driver have to do? How
is the car going to respond to that or what do we need from the
car? And ultimately, how can we bring this together? Those are the
three steps in the process.” Although it is a process that is easy
to describe, it is not necessarily so easy to perfectly execute.
“You are dealing with multiple insights and also every driver is
different,” he added. “So you have to adjust the process with each
driver as well. “Every driver has his own approach and that’s why
it varies a lot from one driver to the next on what a process looks
like.” Working with Max Verstappen Prior to joining Sauber at the
behest of Xevi Pujolar, Max Verstappen’s former race engineer,
Kerkhof started out doing competitive sim racing. That led to the
opportunities at feeder category team Van Amersfoort Racing, where
the Red Bull driver was part of the set up. The pair worked
together, with Kerkhof tasked with setting benchmark times for the
young drivers to match. Eventually, Verstappen was brought into the
fold at sim racing outfit Team Redline, where Kerkhof already was
and remains to this day with his compatriot. “When I look at Max
Verstappen on the current grid, for example, he has a 99% feel for
what he needs and knows how to indicate what needs to be done,”
Kerkhof said of the three-time F1 drivers’ champion. “He is very
easy to do that and that is why he is a very easy person to work
with for a team. “After all, they just have to do what he wants and
then it will work out. That is not true for every driver and then
sometimes some friction arises between the driver and the team.
“During race weekends where one experiences a bad free practice at
a team, you see that reflected in the fact that someone like
Verstappen manages to steer the team in the right direction in the
end. “So that’s where some drivers differ from each other as well,
because for many drivers it’s the other way around. They need the
engineers’ input more instead of being able to give the engineers
the right input.”
Samuel Coop
Go to seatrade maritime