830 metres of start finish straight will serve as the DRS activation zone in this weekend's Spanish GP - the entire length of the straight will be available to the drivers, the longest activation zone so far.
It's clear - the F1 teams love the DRS - the Tech Directors even kept it in while they rejected a number of the proposed 2013 rule changes. It looks as if it's here to stay which I must say in my opinion is a very bad decision and makes for artificial overtaking manoeuvres. This artificiality has led to Abu Dhabi saying that, while they had intended to make alterations to the circuit in order to increase overtaking opportunities they have put the proposals off now that the DRS, KERS, and Tyres have shown that overtaking is possible without costly circuit works.
The websites are all expecting Barcelona to be a great race this year, featuring lots of overtaking - this never happened at Barca before - I mean...it's a test track and the data which all of the teams have on the track would normally serve to ensure that the only overtaking was that of backmarkers (except when it rained of course. Some classic races in the rain - Senna, Schumi, etc).
The Tech Director's said that they wanted to keep it because it makes overtaking easier! In F1 it's not supposed to be easy to overtake. Overtaking should be down to the design of the car and the ability of the driver.
What F1 is saying by keeping DRS is that you as a driver only have to be good enough to get within one second of the guy in front - If you can do that then you've a free pass to go by. It's a ridiculous premise and is not racing.
