Why do Formula 1 cars have eight gears?

Question

Virtually all racing cars of today have six or seven (forward) gears. F1 cars used to have the latter number of gears for a quite a while, until the hybrid era where they started having eight

But why would they need so many? Wouldn’t seven gears suffice?

In: 11

Answer 1

The more gears you have available to you, the more control you have over the engine RPM at a given speed. Because engine torque is proportional to RPM, it allows them to control quite precisely control how much torque is being generated, as to avoid having too much or too little.

With too much torque you could spin the tyres and start sliding or spin. Too little and the car will ‘bog down’ and you won’t get as much speed as you could do.