F1, Ferrari: PU2 with reinforced ICE can count on more power at high revs. PU2 with reinforced ICE can count on a 'fuller' curve.

In this first part of the 2022 Formula One season, the true power of the engine developed in Maranello was not shown as it was more important to finish the reliability data collection program. A task that ended with positive results in the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix at the Imola circuit, which determined Ferrari to run the second power unit also on the F1-75 car of Charles Leclerc in Miami last weekend.

The engine that can be referred to as ‘reinforced ICE’, given the fact that it has benefited from the modifications granted by the FIA, guaranteed all Ferrari engines, including customer teams such as Haas and Alfa Romeo, more power over the entire curve, therefore also for a longer period and not just more at low revs like the first unit. It is no coincidence that the more efficient but less charged Haas VF22 managed to touch 342 km / h in qualifying with Ferrari junior Mick Schumacher. The F1-75 of course also benefited from this situation, being able to limit the gap against the “much less draggy” RB18 cars and just 6 km / h behind in terms of top speed as compared to Red Bull at the Miami International Autodrome.

As anticipated a few days before the event by formu1a.uno, the new ERS was not fitted in Miami and there was no intention of bringing it into this very first part of the 2022 Formula One season. The Maranello team wants to take all the time to be able to develop the hybrid part that debuted last championship on the SF21, given the fact that development started slowly as the most important efforts were concentrated to solve the problems in the thermal part of the unit.

In this phase of the 2022 F1 season, Scuderia Ferrari will therefore be able to count on greater support from the thermal part than at the beginning of the campaign, through the reinforced ICE, which, in the hope that it will not create problems in terms of reliability, will be able to make further positive contributions with the passing of the races; this is also due to the fact that a power unit will have to last 1500 km less, having decided to use four and no longer three during the 2022 season. In the second part of the championship, the contribution of the new hybrid part will also help Ferrari, which will in any case be “less than that given by the 2021 specification introduced in Sochi on Charles Leclerc’s car”, an Italian team technician told formu1a.uno.