Comparing the Ferrari and Red Bull rear wing differences amid 2022 F1 title fight. Comparing the Ferrari and Red Bull rear wings.

It was clear from the very first pre-season testing session that Scuderia Ferrari and Red Bull were the teams to beat in the 2022 Formula One season and the ones who have identified the best solutions given the new rules and regulations which have been introduced this year.

The lap time difference between the F1-75 and the RB18 cars has been very at each of the first five rounds of the current championship, despite the fact that the two top teams a completely different when designing their cars and working on their set-ups.

The Austrian team has so far preferred to go for a lower downforce approach at each circuit, which allowed them to maximize top speed at the expense of performance through corners. The Maranello team went in the opposite direction, focusing on higher downforce settings: as a result, the F1-75 was far behind in terms of speed traps but gained the lap time in the slow areas of the track and, in theory, could count on improved tyre degradation.

As Red Bull and Scuderia Ferrari will continue their thrilling duel for the Formula 1 world titles and will also focus on the development of their 2022 F1 cars, there is a good chance that the two teams could converge in their approach as they attempt not to get outsmarted by the opposition.

During the years they dominated the sport at the beginning of the 2010’s and for the most part during the turbo hybrid era, Red Bull favoured a high downforce but also relatively high drag philosophy which often left it towards the second part of the speed traps. This has changed for the 2022 Formula 1 season, as the RB18 car has constantly been fastest at the end of straights, a performance that has allowed the Austrian team to be able to challenge Ferrari even when the Italian side proved faster in qualifying and could start the race ahead.

For now it looks like Red Bull have the ability to extract better performance from the more generous underfloor and this has allowed them to use less rear wing as compared to Scuderia Ferrari, helping them achieve better top speeds. It seems comfortable with where it has placed its car in the set-up window, because most likely the Maranello team will have to be the one which changes some of its wing settings in the future.

Since the start of the 2022 Formula 1 championship, Scuderia Ferrari has relied on a set-up more conducive in order to improving cornering speed and gain an advantage in the slow sections of the track. Yet Ferrari went to Miami with a new, lower downforce rear wing, confirming it was aware of the disadvantages related to the top speed performance. Eventually, the Italian side decided not to use it, explaining that the low grip track surface determined it to continue with its well-known downforce levels.

Still, that was the third different rear wing configuration for Ferrari during the first five rounds of the 2022 Formula One season, as the Maranello team have already used two subtly different configurations until now. As pointed out by Motorsport, the mail difference between those two versions is related to the transition points (arrowed) with more downforce generated in the central portion of the spoon-shaped wing traded against the drag reduction made possible in the outer section of the wing.

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The Maranello team decided to go for a lower downforce version of these two configurations for the race which took place at the Miami International Autodrome in Florida, removing the Gurney from the trailing edge of the upper flap with the goal of reducing reduce the downforce and drag a little more too. On the other hand, the new Ferrari rear wing, which was brought to Miami but was not used during the race weekend (it was then seen on the F1-75 car of Charles Leclerc during the filming day which took place at the Monza track last week), is for minimum downforce and has de-powered wing profiles.

The new concept, that should be ideal for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix at the Baku City Circuit and could be tested during the Spanish Grand Prix weekend, includes a much flatter mainplane design, akin to the new design introduced by Mercedes in Miami and already seen on the likes of the Alpine A522 in 2022.

Ferrari also switched out the steering arm fairing in an effort to alter its aerodynamic characteristics (above).

The specification used in Miami has more of a cricket bat-style layout than the one used elsewhere (inset) and provides a much broader surface that will not only affect the local airflow but also the path taken around the surrounding suspension elements.