It might sound like bad fuel efficiency but the engine efficiencies they have managed to achieve are insane. The latest Mercedes and Ferrari engines are able to gain 47% efficiency [1]. Compare that to the road cars which are able to do 25-30% thermal efficiency and Prius which can manage 40%.

In my opinion, the fuel efficiency suffers because it's a sport at the end of the day and burning more fuel at a higher rate (limited to 100 kg/hour) gives you more power.

[1] https://arstechnica.com/cars/2016/05/turbulent-times-for-for...

No it's not, but keep in mind that the cars accelerate at an average of around 1.45g.

If it weren't for the inability to transfer all of the power to motion (due to traction loss), they could accelerate from 0 to 100 kph (62 mph) in around 1 second.

With the down force provided with increased speed, they actually accelerate faster from 100 to 200 kph (62 to 122 mph) than from 0 to 100 [1]:

    0 to 100 km/h (62 mph): 2.4 seconds
    0 to 200 km/h (124 mph): 4.4 seconds
    0 to 300 km/h (186 mph): 8.4 seconds

[1] 2016 Mercedes W07 (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formula_One_car)

Fuel efficiency tests in a road car aren't performed by driving flat out for two hours.

Very much this. In fact I would suspect the extreme opposite is performed, by anorexic hyper miling people looking at the wind directions for any possible advantage - the brake pedal never to be touched.

I took my old (APR ECUd, rear sway bars, otherwise stock) turbo charged Polo GTI on the Winston racetrack once (V8 trucks practice day) to work on my driving skills, and it was surprising - but not at all unreasonable - to see the remaining fuel in KMs estimate perform a complete nosedive.

The fuel efficiency numbers of the F1s are truly awesome.

Exactly. Take any car and race it flat out for two hours; see how much fuel you burn. Especially with a turbocharged car, it's possible to have pretty decent fuel economy in regular driving, while still going through a ton when you're really pushing it (and getting the power to match).

Well they're in par with fuel consumption of supercars. For example, a Lamborghini Aventador has 10 MPG, an Aston Martin V12 Vantage has 12 MPG, a Bentley Continental has 13, a Ferrari 488 GTB has 15,a McLaren 570GT has 16, a Mercedes AMG GT also has 16 as does a Nissan GT-R, and only Porsches get a tad above 20. Considering that none of the above could hold a candle to an F1 car, its fuel consumption doesn't sound too exotic.

Consider also that the above stats are (I assume) based on NEDC, a driving cycle so scared of acceleration even a Lada Niva [1] has to be gentle with the throttle.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LADA_4x4

They probably would have decent fuel economy if they did a 20 minute commute at 50mph because they are really light and have low drag.

Conversely, my family wagon would probably not be very efficient if I did 0-150-0mph a few dozen times between home and work.

The driving patterns are a bit different

Power consumption at enough speed is determined by drag, which depends quadratically with speed

And these cars have quite a lot of drag to give them downforce. The truly amazing cars have "efficient" downforce, which is where for a given level they've managed it with lower drag than the competition.

Some examples of low-drag downforce are if they can force vortices along the sides of the floor from elements on the front wing, which gives them similar benefits to the ground-effect skirts that Lotus and Williams used to great effect at the tail end of the 70s.

What's amazing is when you see an F1 car in humid conditions, because you can make out the vortices from the rear wing.

It's also impressive to see them in the rain, because the spray coming off the back of the car [0] shows you exactly how much air the cars are moving to get the downforce they have.

[0]: https://www.jamesallenonf1.com/wp-content/uploads/XPB_789346...