Theory Number 1: Slipstreaming doesn't work
Slipstreaming is often seen as a means of increasing your speed prior to attempting an overtaking manoeuvre but it's difficult to pull off and here's why: when you're slipstreaming, you benefit from reduced air resistance, so you're using less fuel. As soon as you come out of the slipstream, the fuel that you haven't burnt as a result of this means that you're heavier and therefore slower than the car in front. You'll never get past.
Theory Number 2: Successful Finnish drivers need lots of Ks in their names
Finnish drivers need at least two Ks in their names if they are to be really successful and more than two is preferable. Mika Hakkinen, Keke Rosberg and rally aces Hannu Mikkola and Juha Kankkunen are all classic examples, while Kimi Raikkonen has an above-average K-coefficient and should go far. Formula 3 lunatic Heikki Kovaleinen looks set to provide yet more evidence in favour of the theory. Poor old Mika Salo was destined never to make it really big.
Theory Number 3: Dark cars are slower than light cars*
It's recently been discovered that light particles (called "photons") have mass, albeit a very small mass. While light colours, such as white or silver, tend to reflect heat and light, darker colours are more likely to absorb them. During a race, every time a photon hits a light car, it will be reflected but whenever a photon strikes a dark car, it will be absorbed and its mass added to the mass of the car, so dark cars will get gradually heavier and therefore slower. This effect will be more marked during sunnier races and may go some way to explaining why Minardi's mainly black car struggled to be competitive in 2002.
*This extract from The Journal of Ludicrous Science is included for anyone who doubts the science is this article:
"It's a well-known result of relativity that as objects approach the speed of light, their mass approaches infinity, which is why normal objects tend not to approach the speed of light - it interferes with their diet plans. Now, the only way photons can possibly approach the speed of light is for them to inversely obey the same principle. As they accelerate towards the speed of light, their mass actually decreases and so their rate of acceleration allows them to reach the speed of light. Fortunately, the laws governing this are not exactly inverted, and the mass of stationary photons is not infinite - otherwise they would undergo gravitational collapse and become tiny irritating black holes. Due to Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, no one is quite sure how much a stationary photon actually weighs. But researchers are working on an estimate based on the relative lack of speed of a Minardi F1 racing car."
Theory Number 4: Formula One needs Ferrari
Erm...,why exactly?
Theory Number 5: Motorsport doesn't just attract short drivers; it creates them
It has long been considered an advantage for a driver to be of diminutive stature if he or she is to fit comfortably into the confines of a modern racing car; a look at the line-up of any high-level series will confirm that six-footers are in short supply. In fact, instead of being a contributing factor to a driver's presence on the grid, lack of height is more usually caused by it. Drivers of modern single-seater racing cars are all but lying down in the car and the phenomenal forces they experience during braking have the effect of compressing the vertebrae and discs in the spine, with the result that a driver can be up to an inch shorter at the end of a full season's competition than he or she was at the start of it. Of course, acceleration stretches the driver but this force is an order of magnitude lower than that experienced under braking and the overall effect is of shortening rather than elongating. Over time drivers can see their height reduce in direct proportion to the length of their careers, so that F1 stalwart little Johnny Herbert shrank by nearly a foot during his decade at the top level, while the altitudinous Justin Wilson, whose Formula One career has so far lasted but a single season, remains a towering giant.
