Driving a race car requires more than good hand-eye coordination and the stomach for G-forces. It also requires a truckload of high-tech gear. Ferrari’s Formula 1 team and the results of seven-time world champion driver Michael Schumacher are heavily influenced by technology. This includes software designed in-house and hardware with standard components such as the Opteron processor from team sponsor Advanced Micro Devices.
A good deal of the high-performance work takes place off the asphalt in the “box,” the garage where cars get their tires changed during a race. That’s where the computers collect the telemetry data on how the car is meeting the demands of the course. Dieter Gundel, head of racetrack electronics at Ferrari, sat down with ZDNet Germany to explain how the high-profile team gets an edge at the track.
How much standard software do you use? In comparison, how much of the software that you use is developed in-house, depends which applications you are referring to. Office products are standard Microsoft. Design and calculation tools (CAD and CAM) are standard workstation products. All car-control and most of the data-analysis applications are written in-house, as are specific database products. It is not easy to give specific numbers because different groups use different tools.