According to British senior performance engineer Jock Clear, Scuderia Ferrari did not “copy” their opponents Red Bull as the Maranello team introduced its newly revised sidepods last time out; instead, they simply “looked at what they did” and evaluated the benefits of such a design.
After a disappointing start to the 2023 Formula 1 season with only one podium finish (scored by Charles Leclerc at the Baku City Circuit) and consistent defeats against Red Bull, the Italian side decided to introduce new sidepods on the SF-23 in the previous round of the championship, the Spanish Grand Prix, with the clear goal of unlocking more speed from the 2023 single-seater.
While some have compared the revised sidepods to the Alpine, Aston Martin, or Red Bull designs, they actually align with the downwash concept that Austrian side pioneered last season when the new rules and regulation were introduced. As Red Bull dominated the previous F1 campaign, securing both championships and currently leading this year’s campaign with seven wins from seven events that have taken place so far, their philosophy is starting to influence the rest of the field. Even Mercedes has updated their W14 design with downwash sidepods.
Yet Jock Clear, who serves as Charles Leclerc’s driver coach, emphasizes that the Italian side’s new design is not a mere imitation of Red Bull’s idea.
“When people launch their car, they’re all convinced about it. So, nobody says: ‘we put these sidepods on, but we weren’t convinced about them’,” – the British engineer explained when asked about Scuderia Ferrari’s call to change its development direction – “We are all convinced about what we had. But then we all have to learn from what other people are doing and also what we’re doing. We’re not copying anyone, per se. We’re looking at what they did, we’re going back to our tunnel, and trying to find out if that works. It’s appeared on the car now because it works.”
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“Ultimately, we only follow the science and the great thing about aerodynamics, and a great thing about this sport and the reason we do it, in my case for 30 years, is because every day is different, every year is different, every car is different. We’re still learning. There are a million ways to solve the problems and you’re never going to cover all of them.” – the Ferrari team engineer continued.
Scuderia Ferrari had a strong start last year, securing victory in two out of the first three events with Charles Leclerc, in Bahrain and Australia. However, as Red Bull continued to refine their RB18 challenger, the Italian side gradually lost their momentum and Red Bull emerged as the dominant force to beat. This meant that the Austrian side easily went on to win an impressive 17 out of the 22 races last year, while Ferrari managed only two more victories following the Australian Grand Prix. This year, Red Bull has maintained their dominance by winning all seven races so far, while Ferrari has been struggling to even secure a place in the top three, falling behind Mercedes and Aston Martin especially in terms of race pace.
“As soon as you see what someone else is doing well, and you get that in your tunnel, you’re disciplined enough not to have a knee jerk and just chuck it on your car, because it won’t work.” – Jock Clear said – “You have to give yourself a couple of months to get it sorted and to get it to work with your car. And then you say: actually, I can see where they’re coming from there.’
“What you see is the result of that, and it’s going to lead to a further development down that avenue. We’ve sort of started to investigate a new avenue to go down. It’s one of those organic developments, isn’t it/ I’m sure we looked at that from day one of the first test, where you look at the different cars and you look at everybody’s solution, and you start to think: ‘okay, maybe there are other ways they could have solved this.’ As soon as the Red Bull’s dominance became clear, obviously you have to look very, very closely at what they’re doing. So, in a normal process, I would say that you’re probably looking at two months ago where you had to choose this avenue to go down.” – the Ferrari senior performance engineer concluded.
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