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, the bigger the chance that you can use the right gear for every angle and speed of a given curve and are always in the Rev segment for the optimal power.

F1 Cars can change gears incredibly fast and are accelerating and decelerating after and before curves more than most other racing cars, so having more gears is just better.

Also with low torque and high HP you generally want more gears anyway.