Ferrari at Imola experienced the first real setback of the 2022 Formula 1 season. After the three triumphal races in Sakhir, Jeddah and Melbourne, in which two victories, a second place and five overall podiums for the Maeanello team were achieved, as both Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz had a very disappointing weekend, depriving the numerous Ferrari fans present at Imola of the satisfaction of seeing a the team on the podium.
The negative result was due more to bad luck and individual errors than to a general negative performance of the F1-75 car, but certainly the overall impressions is that the Red Bull appeared faster than the F1-75. In Ferrari, however, there is no rush regarding the introduction of the new updates. The plan to bring a more significant upgrade to the ‘traditional’ setting of Barcelona will be maintained.
As Mattia Binotto had already anticipated at the end of the Imola weekend, in fact, the trip to Miami will see Ferrari introduce only some slight corrections related to the particular characteristics of the new American track: “We’ll have a few new parts on the car because first Miami is a high-speed circuit compared to the ones we’ve had so far. In terms of downforce, we will run something different compared to what we have here. Hopefully that level of downforce we bring to Miami, we are quite confident it’s quite an efficient one. But we know as well that got a good medium-low downforce package as well that will be competitive. It will be a completely new track, a new challenge. Quite interesting, I’m pretty curious to be there. So we will adapt our car in terms of downforce level, which is important.”
The Santerno circuit, as it had also happened in Australia, highlighted the problems that Ferrari still has regarding the infamous porpoising. The bouncing of the car on the straight, which is causing so many nightmares in Mercedes, also affects the F1-75.
The Italian car is significantly less penalized by this problem than its rival from across the Channel, but the fact remains that Maranello’s intention is to be able to eliminate this phenomenon as soon as possible: “We’re still working on the porpoising which as you see is quite visible. We’ve got it certainly more than the one of Red Bull and in there there’s some performance potential that we need to try to get. So this is the main one for Miami but let me say that the main upgrades will come soon after.” – he added.
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Straight line speed and tire managing are where Red Bull seems to excel: “They have a good top speed. It was like this at Imola and it was impossible to overtake without DRS. Red Bull has a good engine, we have a good engine, and overall I think the situation is very balanced between us. On tire management, Red Bull did a better job at Imola, especially in the Sprint race. We have to verify why it wasn’t like that for us”.
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