Ask any fan of F1 racing—or, if you can find one, someone who has ever driven a Ferrari to its performance limits—what makes these cars go so fast, and you are likely to get the same answer: the brakes. To the uninitiated, this might seem counter intuitive at first, but it readily makes sense. Nobody would push these 700 horsepower monsters towards corners at blurring speed without the confidence in their ability to slow down rapidly at the last moment. As product developers, we can draw valuable lessons from this simple fact as we seek ever faster means to take concepts from the lab to the commercial market successfully.