During the third free practice session for the 13th round of the 2024 Formula 1 championship, the Hungarian Grand Prix, Scuderia Ferrari had given little encouraging signs regarding expected confirmations for the Budapest weekend. The set-up chosen by the Prancing Horse was clearly not optimal. The Maranello technicians chose to start by optimizing the slower sections of the Hungaroring, then trying to contain the gap in the fast corners of the second sector. It was the second sector that posed the biggest limitation for the red cars, where the two SF-24 single-seaters lack rear-end stability. In the middle of the corner, the red cars lose rear-end grip, forcing the drivers to make corrections mid-corner. Another issue seems to be handling on the corners at high speeds.
The Ferrari often becomes unstable, due to a very low ride height in hopes of generating downforce to be effective in high-speed sections. The problem is that the stiffness is not very high and the car becomes unsettled at high speeds. For this reason, the Maranello engineers decided to modify the front and rear anti-roll bars. The aim was to stiffen them by one step to keep the car’s underbody as stable as possible. However, this reduced mechanical grip, as confirmed by the performance in the first two corners.
On the first attempt in Q3, the Spanish Ferrari driver optimized his performance in the first sector, securing fourth position. Temperatures played an important role once again. Building up the setup around a much hotter track led to a loss of direction during qualifying when the track cooled down. This shifted the car’s optimal working point, worsening the level of grip. So did the new floor work? We can’t give definitive confirmations since the Hungaroring is not the right track to validate an upgrade.
Furthermore, there aren’t many points where bouncing can occur. The new updated underbody in the ‘kick’ area was confirmed by Ferrari and used on both cars during the qualifying session. A certain surplus of downforce did arrive, as the red cars achieved a certain balance in the fast sections, although overall, they are slower than Red Bull and McLaren. Since this is not a track where efficiency is crucial, we can’t say if it provided any concrete help, because the SF-24 cars were inherently very rear-loaded with the balance shifted towards the rear end.
Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur argues that overloading the second axle leads to significant aerodynamic bouncing. Therefore, there’s a limit to how much the car can be loaded, and, for example, the underbody cannot be lowered too much. This also relates to efficiency, which could be a significant limitation next week at the Spa-Francorchamps circuit in Belgium. Red Bull also had several updates to their car, which overall should help achieve greater stability of the fluid structure enveloping the car. The upgrades were validated but did not seem to provide an obvious contribution.
In addition to this, once again we heard Max Verstappen complaining about a lack of rotation, which prevents him from using the more favorable lines in the middle sector. Normally, on this track, the balance is shifted more towards the rear, which weakens the front end. Cars with a good baseline of front grip, like the McLaren, have fewer problems. At Red Bull, they are struggling to find the perfect balance and seem to have weakened the front end a bit too much. On Friday, they did several tests with front load, but the Formula 1 world champion was still not happy.
From an aerodynamic point of view, Red Bull loaded the rear heavily, but the benefits were not seen in the middle sector. Max Verstappen optimized the first sector of the track, managing to set the best split time to counterbalance the second sector. However, in the final sector, he lost fractions of a second to McLaren, which resulted in the loss of pole position. Observing the telemetry data and the ideal sector times, we see that the MCL39 and the RB20 were on the same level. Ferrari, the third force, is 0.4 seconds behind on a single lap, slightly ahead of the Mercedes of the seven-time Formula 1 British world champion.
Lando Norris had the most balanced car and did well to maximize the result on track. An MCL38 car that is easy to drive with the best compromise between high and low speeds. In corners 2, 5, 13, and 14, McLaren shows a great amount of front grip, confirmed by the few corrections on the steering wheel. In the middle sector, they create a gap, gaining several tenths even against the Red Bull RB20 of the Dutchman. In the first and third sectors, they are on par with the other cars, confirming the excellent setup they have built. Finally, it is no coincidence that Mercedes has become competitive again with these temperatures.
The W15 is a car with a more front-end balance, while this track is more rear-limited. Their problem was to contain the temperatures at the rear to achieve maximum traction. With significantly cooler track surface, this problem was minimized, as was the case two weeks ago in the British Grand Prix at the Silverstone circuit. Overall, the Brackley team built a setup quite similar to Ferrari’s, which is still quite comfortable on this type of track. In the middle sector, Lewis Hamilton and Carlos Sainz essentially achieved the same result.
However, although both showed an almost satisfactory balance in this area of the track, the level of competitiveness was not up to par. Competitiveness was undoubtedly insufficient compared to Red Bull and McLaren’s performance. Ferrari held a small advantage in the first sector, where they showed great things on Friday, while Mercedes struggled, unable to find the pace. In this particular and somewhat sad battle to be the third force, the first sector made the main difference on the stopwatch.
Source: FUnoanalisitecnica
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