In a normal environment, your Information Technology hardware tends to sit in one place, often for years, and never gets switched off. F1 tracks are not a normal environment. We’re constantly on the move, so we’re rather unique. As the lead IT trackside engineer, I’m responsible for everything IT-related at the circuit. Given how much in F1 is IT-related, it’s a big job. Networking is a major focus, but we have to dabble in a bit of everything really, from software development to cyber security, the physical work of laying all the cabling, and constantly managing all the servers. If someone’s having a problem getting online, or left their charging cable at home, we’ll help them out with that too.
The core of the job is establishing a secure private tunnel between the track and the factory that allows for constant communication and a huge amount of data sharing – around one terabyte a week. Work starts at the track on the Monday before the race, and obviously carries on until pack-up time on the Sunday night. We’re based to one side of the walkway into the garage, where all the racks live. The cars aren’t the only things that require spares; so does our IT hardware, and our little office area is filled with bits and pieces ready in case a replacement is needed – motherboards, graphics cards, innards for storage devices, USB sticks, you name it we’ve got it. Left your headset on the plane or your mouse in your hotel room? Just have a rummage over there.
Most of the times we have IT issues are when we’re in a hot country. Singapore and the Middle East can be particularly challenging. And when it rains heavily, that’s another potential drama. Cool and dry, that’s the goal. Power situations can differ hugely from race to race. In the USA, for example, it’s half the voltage of the UK. In some locations, the current can be temperamental which can cause issues with servers. Last year we lost everything a couple of hours before Free Practice 1 and didn’t get back online until ten minutes before the session.
We have back up servers just in case disaster hits, and we have our own back-up generators now which we didn’t last year. We have two of near enough everything. We’ll often upgrade our gear twice a year, and we’ll always make sure we’re on the latest versions of stuff and everything is properly maintained.
My interest in IT really grew out of my love of video games as a kid. I did IT as an A-level and went on to study computer science at university. I’ve always been a bit geeky. Normally in IT you specialise, but doing it for an F1 team trackside, as I say, you get involved in everything and it’s also very physical. This isn’t a nine-to-five desk job. You’re on your feet all day, and there’s pressure mentally too.
I worked at Mercedes and Red Bull Racing previously. They’re both very mature operations. At Aston Martin, we’re getting there and you can see the progress we’ve made. Because of how fundamental IT is to everything at the track and everything at the factory, there are performance gains to be made here. If we provide a quicker, more reliable network to the engineers, they can communicate and share faster. If we provide more powerful servers and better storage, then they can process the data and analyse it faster. That directly improves the lap-time in the long run.
