Track type | Downforce (lb at 200mph) | % Front |
---|---|---|
Road course | 5000 | 45 |
Short oval | 3500 | 35 |
Long oval | 2500 | 35 |
Super speedway | 1500 | 33 |
In general, it's better to sacrifice downforce to decrease drag on very fast circuits like ovals, whereas much more downforce is optimal for road courses. Downforce therefore varies between tracks, but in general F1 cars are optimized to create more downforce, since they mostly race on twisty tracks. The wiki article on F1 cars says:
Since downforce scales as the square of speed, this would predict a downforce:weight ratio of roughly 6:1 at 200mph for an F1 car, which would be about 8000-9000 lb.