Scuderia Ferrari F1-75 car for the previous championship was able to generate impressive downforce levels, thanks to its heavily-sculpted sidepods feeding upper level airflow into the critical floor and underfloor Venturi tunnels which the ground effect cars require in order to be able to be fast. However, the 2022 Ferrari F1 car had a key weakness on the straights, especially in comparison with the highly efficient Red Bull RB18 single-seater.
The Austrian side started the 2022 F1 season with a car that seemed slightly slower than the F1-75, but quickly improved and even went on to easily secure both Formula 1 titles, after the Maranello team’s impressive start and performance imploded. As a result, the Italian side focused much of its development work for the new SF-23 car with the goal of reducing the deficit to Red Bull in terms of aerodynamic efficiency stakes.
Scuderia Ferrari has been testing several wing packages during the 2023 Formula 1 pre-season testing session at the Bahrain International circuit in the last few days and the SF-23 challenger seems to be working well based on the data from GPS traces compared to the RB19 down the track’s long straights. However, the RB19 seems to be better in high-speed corners – with a caveat that teams typically run in lower engine power modes or with set heavy fuel loads during the testing runs.
Charles Leclerc took part in a press conference in Bahrain after his last appearance at the Sakhir circuit before the first round of the new season and was asked if the Maranello team’s small design philosophy change had produced some differences in terms of feeling of the car for its drivers. The Monegasque confirmed that “it did. I won’t go into too much details, but I think that was done in the right way. And I think we have a less draggy car, so that should be better this year. But it changed other characteristics. All in line with what we expected, but we still need to find the right set-up for these new characteristics.” – the Ferrari man explained.
Charles Leclerc, who finished the morning session of the final Bahrain testing day with the fastest lap, continued by pointing out that he expects “us to be a little bit quicker in the straights, maybe struggling a little bit more in the corners” as a result of the design changes, that include a skinnier rear wing package.
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This was an area Ferrari has focused a lot in the first part of the previous championship while it was battling Red Bull, before the Italian side lost valuable points due to a series of power unit technical failures and some poor strategy decisions from the Maranello pit wall. As a result of the power unit issues, Ferrari was forced to limit the engine power in the second part of the year, which meant the F1-75 car was no longer able to overcome the extra drag of the downforce-packing Ferrari design, another critical area the Italian side tried to fix ahead of the 2023 Formula 1 season:
“With this three-day test I can say that we are still working quite a bit on track to find the sweet spot of the car in terms of set-up. So, I hope there’s some margin still – that we haven’t found the sweet spot yet.” – Scuderia Ferrari Monegasque driver concluded on Saturday in Bahrain.
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