alt Hacker News> Seems a lot better place to learn than in the middle of the race and earning $0 for the race.
That's... not how it works at all, though. There are no prizes for individual races and the championship money is also pennies to the teams.
Mercedes's Kimi Antonelli is going to win the WDC anyway for sure at this point, given the points difference.
> Isn't that the entire point of a simulator to learn things that are too expensive to learn in the real world?
You're right but this is not those expensive things. Track time is extremely limited, so the primary role of the sim is to develop the car and how it feels to the drivers, mainly so the setup feels perfect to them.
System-level bugs etc must have their own testing but sim is mainly for driver-engineer testing. Many drivers also don't like using the sim at all like Hamilton.
the championship money is also pennies to the teams
The constructors championship money is absolutely a massive impact for the teams. Last place (11th) is estimated at ~$50 million, 5th place is estimated ~$100 million, and 1st place ~$140 million. For a team like Williams or Haas, every position they move up the ranking makes a substantial budget impact (both of those have estimated total budgets ~$230 million). Even for one of the big 4, with budgets in the $400 million range, the $40 million swing from 4th to 1st is not insignificant.
Heck, Otmar had to pay his staff out of his own pocket back in the day (I don't remember what cost-cap was in place back then - I think that was during his time at Force India). Those lower teams are more stable now that 20 years ago, but still struggle to get enough sponsor money to compete.