Canadian Setups F1 2020

F1 2020 setup guide overview – Canada

Canada is characterised by long straights and heavy braking zones, and a lovely view over the St Lawrence River! The extremely quick nature of the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve requires a low downforce, soft suspension setup in F1 2020. This combination allows you to be quick on the straights and attack each corner and chicane around this 2.7 mile track.

Jumping striaght in to our F1 2020 setup guide for Canada, we’ll start with the aerodynamics. As I mentioned, Canada requires a setup with reasonably low downforce. You should look to lower the front aerodynamics as much as you feel comfortable with, around 3 should be enough for most racers. Then keep the rear wing aero about average.

You would think that due to the extremely long back straight, and other long straights, that we would recommend lowering the rear wing aero as well. However you will need a fair amount of grip through the quick direction changes of the chicanes in the middle of the track. Combining a low aero front wing and balanced rear wing gives the best combination of speed through the corners and speed down the straight.

There are a few reasonably high demand traction zones around Canada in F1 2020, but not many. The main areas you might struggle are going through turns 2, 7 and 10. However these traction zones aren’t massively demanding and can be managed with good throttle control.

So because the rest of the corners around Canada are taken at reasonably high speed, we will want to increase our on-throttle differential to maximise our acceleration. We would recommend keeping the off-throttle fairly balanced.

Canada isn’t too hard on your tyres, allowing us to run a balanced to aggressive camber setup. Somewhere between average and a full qualifying setup should be good, and wont destroy your tyres during a long race stint. You should also look to decrease your toe to allow for more speed and less drag down the long straight before the last chicane.

As I mentioned, you should look to setup your suspension for Canada reasonably soft. You will be riding almost every kerb through the first and middle part of the lap so don’t want to be bouncing off of them. A soft suspension will allow your car to adjust to the elevation changes and the bumps without sending your car in to the wall.

Keep your anti-roll bars a little more balanced to give your car decent responsiveness. This will help through all of the chicanes around Canada and will ensure you don’t experience too much understeer while exiting the chicanes.

Finally for the suspension setup, lower your ride height to around 3 or 4 to maximise performance all round.

Because Canada has long straights, it also has a few heavy braking zones. Notably these are in to the hairpin before the long straight and the final chicane. Both of these spots are good overtaking spots, so you will want to slow your car down in the quickest time possible. Ensure this is possible by increasing your brake pressure.

You should then move your brake bias rearward to around 52 to 54. This will help distribute weight transfer and braking power through the middle part of the lap.

Finally, keep your tyre pressures reasonably balanced to round off our F1 2020 Canada setup. If you are struggling for traction out of the slower corners, you can lower your rear tyre pressures a litte.

How To Best Drive The Canadian Grand Prix Circuit in F1 2020

Canada is extremely fun to drive once you get in to a rhythm, as many of the right – left chicanes can be taken at reasonable speed. This is a true drivers circuit and does allow for some overtaking in the final and first parts of the lap.

Try to setup your car to be balanced, and not too rear happy. You will require a good rear end to drive consistently through a full race distance, and you certainly don’t want to be spinning your wheels through the fast chicanes.

Getting pole around Canada isn’t crucial, as you can make up places reasonably consistently. Aim to pull your main overtake in to turn 1. This is at the end of the pit straight, and after the long back straight. Pulling off an overtake here will give you some breathing room to pull out a gap through the middle of the lap.

Drivers wont be able to overtake you through this section of the lap, so you can try to increase your lead by over a second so they don’t have a chance to overtake you down the back straight.

If you are quick out of the second sector, we would recommend not trying to overtake in to the hairpin before the long straight. Doing so will give the driver you just passed a good opportunity to retake their position down the long straight. Instead, get as close to the car as you can through the hairpin and focus on maximising your corner exit.

You can then either pass into the final chicane, which can sometimes be a little risky, or stay close to pull an overtake in to the first corner as mentioned above.