Formula One the 'best showcase' for AI in sport, Oracle Red Bull executive says

The role of artificial intelligence in Formula One is set to grow, with the sport providing the “best showcase” for the technology, according to an executive from Oracle Red Bull Racing.

“Data seeps through every element of our business,” Jack Harington, the F1 team's technical partnerships lead told The National at Oracle AI World in Las Vegas.

F1 has progressed massively over the past few years and the rate of tech integration has dramatically increased, he said.

“I think it is the best showcase for technology. We are heavily reliant on our tech partners to deliver us tools that we can utilise in the running of our cars, the running of our business. It’s a hotbed for testing out technology.”

F1 has been among the foremost adopters of AI in recent years. There are 300 to 600 sensors embedded in every F1 car, measuring variables such as engine temperature, tyre pressure, brake wear and aerodynamic loads, according to IMD.

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Nearly every F1 team has collaborations with leading tech companies, including Microsoft, Oracle, AWS, Google, Dell Technology, AMD and Palantir. Teams use cloud infrastructure and real-time data analytics to run billions of simulations, accelerate car design, optimise race strategy and gain a competitive edge, IMD said in a report last year.

Mr Harington decline to be exact on the number of sensors on the cars. Teams remain secretive about the AI plans, he said.

“These [the cars] are data-driven monsters. And we need to constantly monitor every element of the car. I think if it were left to the engineers, we would have thousands and thousands of sensors, but every sensor is a weight and weight in Formula One is very important, so we have to reduce the amount of sensors we have on the car to make sure it is competitive,” he said.

“We probably pull around two terabytes of data from the car every session that we're out on track.

“There's many millions of data points within that that we have to dig into to really understand whether our car is performing as we want it to, and to maximise its performance over a lap or throughout a race.”

Show caption: Ahead of a race weekend, the F1 team runs eight billion Mont…

One example of using the data is its strategy simulation, he said. “So, we have two kinds of data in F1. You have your known data, which is things like tyre degradation curves – or how long the tyres are lasting for. Then you have unknown data, which is things like a yellow flag, a red flag, an unexpected overtake, safety car, etc.”

The team uses Monte Carlo simulations – a computational technique that uses repeated random sampling to predict the probability of different outcomes – ahead of races.

Before a race weekend, the team runs eight billion Monte Carlo race simulations to try to plot the fastest way from the start to the finish of the race. During practice sessions, all the data is gathered and collected. “And we introduce that data into our simulations and we run another eight billion Monte Carlo simulations, and then if something happens during the race, we're actually able to update those models live,” Mr Harington said.

As part of the deal with Oracle, the team has transitioned those simulations to the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure.

“This is a huge advantage for us as a team because now with the ability to scale the amount of simulations that we're running using Oracle Cloud, we are able to actually kind of play war games. So not only are we simulating what's the fastest route from the start to the finish of the race, we're also simulating, if we make a decision, how are the teams going to react to it?” he added.