Since the presentation of the new F1-75 car on February 17, the new Scuderia Ferrari challenger for the 2022 Formula 1 seasonhad captured the attention with its hollowed-out sidepods. A completely different philosophy from that undertaken by rivals Red Bull and Mercedes. Despite this, a bit of pessimism has been hovering in the media regarding the future developments of the single-seater, focusing on how the projects of the other two top teams offer greater room for improvement.
Then the new season started and the first verdict on track was rewarding for the Maranello team in the first two races, while also definitely mitigating these “bad thoughts”. The new Ferrari proved agile, fast, kind to the tires and effective in all track conditions. But that is not all. If the F1-75 has already convinced everyone in terms of performance, one must necessarily take into account a fact that many miss: the car has not yet reached its true level of competitiveness. Put simply, in Maranello they are studying how to make their car work at 100% potential, which is still not even close.
Team principal Mattia Binotto repeated it several times and the free practice in Jeddah confirmed it. In fact, both on Friday and Saturday morning, it was clear that Ferrari was suffering from porpoising, the bouncing that is creating so many headaches at Mercedes. As evidence of this, there are the images and the radio messages of Carlos Sainz in which he complained about this phenomenon. In fact, in free practice, the Maranello team tried different setups and floor configurations: Ferrari tried to lower the car to have a better aerodynamic set-up and make it work at 100%, but they found themselves struggling with porpoising and had to raise the car to overcome this problem.
The exact same procedure that Mercedes carries out already from Bahrain with an extreme loss of aerodynamic load which, inevitably, follows. Red Bull, on the other hand, has already eliminated porpoising, probably starting from the last day of testing at Sakhir, thanks to an important update. When comparing the images of the F1-75 and the RB18 on the Jeddah track, you can practically see the height difference to the ground between the two cars.
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This means that the situation is reversing. Now it is the Ferrari that seems to have the “knife on the side of the handle”. If from Maranello they manage to bring a new floor capable of further limiting or completely canceling the bouncing of the car, then we could discover a different car. An even stronger Ferrari that will unquestionably manage to gain a few more tenths and maybe become the first force on the grid. The news should arrive on the weekend of 22-24 April in Imola: this new floor and an update of the electrical part of the power unit are expected. If everything works perfectly, that weekend could already be decisive for the world championship given the fact that Red Bull are also expected to introduce a big upgrade.
