First, I’ll explain what the “slipstream” is. A car punches a hole in the air when it moves. This hole is exploited by a car behind to reduce the drag of the following car and gain speed on the leading car.
During open-wheel races such as the Indianapolis 500 or some F1 races (DRS notwithstanding), the draft is so strong— it’s like the car behind gains an extra 200 horsepower!
But during NASCAR races at the unrestricted ovals or during sports car races like the Daytona 24, it’s not anywhere nearly as strong. It takes half of the Daytona oval’s back straight to get to the back of a leading GT3 car and pass him, and you’d be lucky to even get to the leader’s rear bumper at unrestricted ovals like Michigan. If anything, it looks like the leading car _gains_ speed. Why is that?
In: Physics
F1 cars and similar have huge amounts of downforce created by their wings. This ultimately means the drag coefficient of an F1 car is higher, so they feel the effects of a wake much more than a NASCAR car.
The downside is that they can’t follow as fast in corners, as the tailing car has less downforce, and therefore less grip at the same speed.
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