Development of a methodology to support strategy decisions in motorsports
Project Completed - Contact: ftm(at)ftm.mw.tum.de
Motivation
The racing strategy in motorsports is concerned with the optimal usage of the resources of driver and vehicle. The goal is to finish the race in the shortest time possible. The distance to the system's performance limit mainly affects energy consumption and tire wear. Depending on the racing series, the energy and the number of tires can be limited or they can be supplied or changed during a pit stop. Accordingly, the determination of time and number of pit stops as well as the choice of tires are tasks assigned to the racing strategy. The pre-defined strategy has to be continuously adapted to the current conditions and events during the race, e.g. yellow flags. The definition and adaption of the racing strategy is often based on experience in lower racing series. In higher racing series advanced tools exist, but their functionality is not published. For the participation of a team from TUM in a racing series for autonomous electric vehicles, the topic will be investigated in more detail.
Objective
The objective of the work is the derivation of simple action recommendations (e.g. increase or decrease pace) for the shortest race time possible based on the current racing situation. Race-specific boundary conditions, such as a limited amount of energy or the possibility of pit stops, should be considered.
Realization
First of all, different racing series are analyzed and compared with regard to the applied racing strategies in order to be able to draw conclusions on strategy-relevant characteristics. Based on this database, various methods will be investigated in order to determine or adapt the strategy depending on the racing series and race situation and to be able to derive appropriate action recommendations. These are to be tested in a simulation as well as in the real racing series afterwards
GitHub
We share our developed software on GitHub: