Scuderia Ferrari Spanish driver Carlos Sainz has admitted that the rules and regulation changes for the 2022 Formula 1 season have reminded him of the beauty of the sport as he contines to get to grips with the Maranello team’s F1-75 car.
The last two years have been very difficult for the Italian side, who due to unfortunate circumstances was not able to keep its usual position fighting for race victoires and podiums and had to settle for far less ambitious targets. However, things are expected to change in 2022 and the first impressions are positive: after the first pre-season testing session which took place at the Circuit de Catalunya, it seems that Ferrari is on the right track to get back in the fight for the top places. No team completed more laps than the Italian side and Charles Leclerc went quickest on day two of the Spanish test.
One of the most striking elements as cars began to be unveiled last month was the difference in design between every team. Charles Leclerc’s Maranello team-mate Carlos Sainz confirmed that the innovation has reminded him of the beauty of the sport.
“We know the work that has been done in a year and a half, there have been things that I have liked and things that I have not. It is what we come to the tests for, to discover things about our car and not stop to think about what the others are doing,” Carlos Sainz said, in a recent interview for AS – “Everyone has surprised me, because of how different we are from each other when the engineers talked about such restricted regulations. It makes you think and it reminds you that F1 is beautiful, I like to see those differences and the imagination of each group of engineers, even if we all reach a similar level later.” – he added.
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Despite the positive impressions from the first testing session ahead of the 2022 Formula One season, the Ferrari driver admitted that there is still work to do see how the new power unit will cope: “We don’t push everything so it’s hard to feel the differences with a new car. If the engines are going to freeze, you have to find the limit performance and then you have five years to improve reliability. We want the most powerful engine, or one of the most powerful.” – Carlos Sainz continued.
When asked about how the new F1-75 cars feels to drive as compared to Ferrari’s challenger from the previous campaign, the Spaniard pointed out that it can “slide a little more. It differs in many things, I notice it above all in the driving style. We can slide a little more. Before you would slam the wheel and go around the corner, now it seems we can play with the cars a bit more. Last year’s cars were designed to go straight. It had a lot of downforce, but when you lost the car, it would go completely off. This one does allow you to play a little more with the car in general, at the entrance and exit of corners, and I want to adapt to that, and it’s fun”.
One major issue which teams have encountered is the ‘porpoising’ effect experienced due to the changes introduced for the new season, which seem to have taken a few teams by surprise: “It is one of the biggest priorities since we went out on the track and we feel it. We have to work on it and the first one who manages to correct it will be able to lower the heights a little more. For the driver it is not comfortable or pleasant at 320km per hour.But it’s also the beauty of Formula 1. The teams seem to have everything under control and when new regulations arrive, and new circumstances, it puts us in our place.” – Scuderia Ferrari Spanish driver Carlos Sainz concluded.
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