According to recent reports in the Italian media, Ferrari is planning to bring a revised gearbox and engine to the season-opening Austrian Grand Prix in a bid to lift its fortunes after a low-key showing in pre-season testing. The Italian outfit was open that it was behind rivals Mercedes and Red Bull ahead of the start of the campaign, which was abandoned on the eve of the Australian GP because of the coronavirus pandemic.
However, German automobile magazine ‘Auto Motor und Sport’ informs that the reports about Ferrari’s upgrades are untrue:
“The Formula 1 season finally starts on July 5th. Mercedes and Red Bull have upgraded their cars properly. Ferrari, on the other hand, is forgoing major upgrades. Nevertheless, in Maranello they are sure to be able to improve the performance.
It’s already a strange season. It starts in the middle of the year, and there are cars on the grid that are already in their second stage of development, although the first one has never raced on the track. We’ve only got to know them to some extent in the garages in Melbourne.
112 days later, the wheel has continued to turn in the design offices, even though 63 days of that were not allowed to work at all. But whoever could, after the factories opened, worked through the developments that were already in the pipeline for the first four races. Ferrari is surprised that the direct competitors were able to achieve so much in such a short time.
Mercedes, for example, is bringing a major aerodynamic upgrade to the Red Bull Ring. The version that would have run up in Melbourne and was used in the final days of testing in Barcelona corresponds to the development status of Christmas 2019, according to technical director James Allison. In the meantime, a lot has piled up, some of which has been worked off before and after the work stoppage.
Red Bull will also be competing in its home races with a greater evolution, as Sports Director Helmut Marko reveals: “The car in Spielberg will not be identical to the one that would have been driven in Melbourne. We brought the upgrade to the car that was scheduled for the fifth race in Barcelona and a second one now for Spielberg. All based on CFD and wind tunnel. There’s a certain amount of uncertainty about that. You go to the third stage without knowing how the first and second updates would have felt in practice. We didn’t have a chance to test it, so we have to assume the data is accurate.”
Reports about Ferrari upgrades untrue
Ferrari was advertised in the Italian media as a half new SF1000, with a slimmer nose, a stiffer gearbox, new rear axle and 30 hp more from the engine. The raceless time has apparently stimulated the imagination. An upgrade on this scale would not be possible at all or would be completely nonsensical. There Ferrari would have already burned more tokens than allowed and would have committed itself to the engine until the end of the season.
“We only have very small changes to the car. It was more important for us to understand the SF1000 better. We have indeed made a good step forward,” confirmed a spokesman. The first significant modifications will probably only be made after the Hungarian GP.
Leave a Reply