After years of stability, F1 reliability can no longer be taken for granted
After years of stability, F1 reliability can no longer be taken for granted
经历多年稳定期后，F1 的可靠性已不再是理所当然
First off, apologies for the lack of a Canadian Grand Prix report at the beginning of this week; Ferrari chose last weekend to show us its new electric vehicle, and between that and Memorial Day, one thing led to another, and here we are. 首先，对于本周初未能发布加拿大大奖赛的报道，我深表歉意；法拉利选择在上周末展示其新款电动汽车，再加上阵亡将士纪念日的缘故，各种琐事堆叠在一起，导致了现在的延误。
Canada was yet another sprint weekend, meaning limited practice time for teams desperate for it to collect data on their various upgrade packages. The race, held on an artificial island built for Expo 67, is often one of the season’s highlights, and 2026 did not disappoint, with some excellent duals among the field. 加拿大站又是冲刺赛周末，这意味着车队收集各种升级套件数据所需的练习时间非常有限。这场在为 1967 年世博会建造的人工岛上举行的比赛，通常是赛季的亮点之一，而 2026 年的比赛也没有让人失望，赛场上出现了一些精彩的对决。
The 19-year-old Italian sophomore Kimi Antonelli now leads his Mercedes teammate George Russell by 43 points in the championship after four straight wins in a row. With 25 points for a win, that means Russell could soon be two whole race wins behind his young in-house rival; never a comfortable spot when competing against someone with identical equipment. 19 岁的意大利二年级生基米·安东内利（Kimi Antonelli）在取得四连胜后，目前在积分榜上以 43 分领先他的梅赛德斯队友乔治·拉塞尔（George Russell）。由于一场胜利积 25 分，这意味着拉塞尔很快就会落后这位年轻的队内竞争对手整整两场比赛的积分；在驾驶相同赛车的情况下与人竞争，这绝非一个舒适的位置。
Then again, one need only look at last year’s championship to realize it’s far too soon to be declarative; we’re only five races in. Last year, Oscar Piastri led Max Verstappen by more than 100 points at the Dutch Grand Prix—race 15 out of 24 that year—yet finished the year 11 points in arrears. 话又说回来，看看去年的锦标赛就会明白，现在下定论还为时过早；我们才进行了五场比赛。去年，奥斯卡·皮亚斯特里（Oscar Piastri）在荷兰大奖赛（当年 24 场比赛中的第 15 场）时还领先马克斯·维斯塔潘（Max Verstappen）超过 100 分，但最终年度积分却落后了 11 分。
It’s not that Russell doesn’t have the measure of Antonelli; he’d been in control of the race—just barely—when his battery suffered a catastrophic failure, ending his day on lap 30. As the late, great British F1 commentator Murray Walker was fond of saying, “To finish first, first you have to finish,” which sounds obvious but contains an important point, as the best Murray quotes always do. 这并不是说拉塞尔的能力不如安东内利；他在比赛中一直处于领先位置（尽管优势微弱），直到第 30 圈电池发生灾难性故障，导致他退赛。正如已故的伟大英国 F1 解说员穆雷·沃克（Murray Walker）常说的那样：“想要获得第一，首先你得完赛。”这句话听起来显而易见，但正如穆雷所有精彩语录一样，它包含着一个重要的道理。
Reliability is historically unusual
可靠性在历史上并不寻常
The fragility of the current cars might strike some as odd, but if anything, it was the hyper-reliable hybrids that raced between 2017 and 2025 that are the real outliers. The last few seasons have been the most reliable in the sport’s history, and by some margin. Even in the 2000s, a driver went into each race knowing there was at least a 40 percent chance their car would fail before the checkered flag. 当前赛车的脆弱性可能会让一些人感到奇怪，但事实上，2017 年至 2025 年间参赛的那些超高可靠性的混合动力赛车才是真正的“异类”。过去几个赛季是该运动历史上可靠性最高的时期，而且优势明显。即使在 2000 年代，车手在参加每场比赛时也知道，他们的赛车在挥动方格旗前发生故障的几率至少有 40%。
Russell’s exit from Canada surely stung; that much was clear from the way he threw his neck surround out of the car and onto the track in disgust. But reliability has robbed drivers in other races much closer to the flag. 拉塞尔在加拿大站的退赛无疑令人痛苦；从他愤怒地将颈部保护装置扔出车外并落在赛道上的举动中，这一点显而易见。但可靠性问题曾在其他比赛中让车手在更接近终点时功亏一篑。
Perhaps the most heartbreaking was Damon Hill’s 1997 Hungarian race. That year’s defending champion, Hill had been unceremoniously dismissed from Williams by the unsentimental team boss after Frank Williams decided that Heinz-Harald Frentzen was the driver his team needed to beat Schumacher. 也许最令人心碎的是达蒙·希尔（Damon Hill）在 1997 年匈牙利站的比赛。作为当年的卫冕冠军，希尔被冷酷无情的车队老板弗兰克·威廉姆斯（Frank Williams）无情地解雇了，因为弗兰克认为海因茨-哈拉尔德·弗伦岑（Heinz-Harald Frentzen）才是车队击败舒马赫所需要的人选。
History proved Williams catastrophically wrong; the move was the final straw for head designer Adrian Newey, causing him to leave the team, and although Williams won the 1997 championship with Jacques Villeneuve, that was the last time it did so and marked the beginning of that team’s decline. 历史证明威廉姆斯的决定错得离谱；这一举动成为了首席设计师阿德里安·纽维（Adrian Newey）离开车队的最后一根稻草。尽管威廉姆斯车队凭借雅克·维伦纽夫（Jacques Villeneuve）赢得了 1997 年的冠军，但那也是他们最后一次夺冠，并标志着该车队衰落的开始。
Hill, jettisoned too late in the season to find a competitive seat, was stuck with the underfunded Arrows team. But 1997 was the start of a tire war between Goodyear and Bridgestone, and Arrows had the Bridgestone tires, which proved to be the preferred rubber on that hot day in Hungary. 希尔在赛季后期才被抛弃，无法找到有竞争力的席位，只能留在资金不足的飞箭（Arrows）车队。但 1997 年是固特异（Goodyear）与普利司通（Bridgestone）轮胎大战的开始，而飞箭车队使用的是普利司通轮胎，事实证明，在匈牙利那个炎热的日子里，这是更优的选择。
After a season of failures and abject results, Hill qualified third but eventually took the lead after the Goodyears on Schumacher’s car blistered. With three laps to go, Hill led by more than half a minute until a hydraulic leak slowed his car to the point that Villeneuve was able to close him down and steal what would have been a well-deserved and much-needed victory for Hill and the winless Arrows team. 在经历了一个充满失败和惨淡成绩的赛季后，希尔排位赛获得第三，但在舒马赫赛车上的固特异轮胎起泡后，他最终取得了领先。在还剩三圈时，希尔领先超过半分钟，直到一次液压泄漏导致他的赛车速度变慢，维伦纽夫得以追上并夺走了这场本应属于希尔和未尝胜绩的飞箭车队的胜利。
This year’s power unit reliability issues are due to the fact that these really are all-new power units, even if the 1.6 L capacity and the V6 layout sound nearly identical to those of 2017–2025. These engines had to be designed to work with conventional turbochargers and not the electronic MGU-H turbochargers of the previous generation. 今年的动力单元可靠性问题源于这些确实是全新的动力单元，尽管 1.6 升排量和 V6 布局听起来与 2017-2025 年的型号几乎相同。这些发动机必须设计为与传统涡轮增压器配合使用，而不是上一代电子 MGU-H 涡轮增压器。