When car development doesn't go as planned: similarities between Ferrari and Aston Martin

Aston Martin’s 2023 Formula One season shows a subtle parallel with Scuderia Ferrari’s 2022 F1 campaign. The Silverstone-based team started the championship in great form, playing the role of the second force behind Red Bull. In Canada, an important package of updates arrived, aimed at reducing the gap to the Austrian side, but instead, the AMR23 began to regress, becoming the fifth force. Aston Martin, like the Maranello team last season, reflects the pitfalls of ground-effect Formula 1, where increasing performance can disrupt a car’s balance.

Mike Krack – Mattia Binotto: similar statements
Mike Krack spoke again during the press conference at the Belgian Grand Prix. The Team Principal of Aston Martin confirmed the regression in terms of pace following the package of updates from Canada: “These cars are very complex. Developing doesn’t simply mean continually increasing downforce. Very often, you introduce characteristic changes to the car or create other effects, and probably that’s what happened. We need to eliminate these problems we introduced as soon as possible.”

It’s hard not to notice the similarity with the statements made in 2022 by Mattia Binotto, the former Team Principal of Ferrari. The Prancing Horse had brought a new floor to Paul Ricard in July, but in the subsequent outings, the F1-75 began to struggle, especially in race pace: “The development we brought to France, practically the latest from an aerodynamic point of view, was done to improve the bouncing, and for us, it should have been a significant step forward in reducing it. Inevitably, it also brought some secondary behaviors, desired nonetheless, but they are currently limiting us in some areas.”

The challenges of ground-effect aerodynamics
The statements of the two Team Principals reflect the pitfalls of the current regulations. In the dogmas of Formula 1, improving performance is associated with increasing downforce and aerodynamic efficiency. However, the process proves more complex with ground-effect cars compared to the past. Lewis Hamilton had already mentioned the difficulties in finding new performance with the current cars, referring to the risk of encountering porpoising by continuously lowering the car and increasing downforce. However, the statements of Mike Krack and Mattia Binotto refer to something different.

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The first two years of ground-effect regulations show that to find performance, there’s a risk of compromising the balance, suspension settings, sensitivity to wind, and driving conditions. This introduces a series of behaviors that increase the car’s nervousness and unpredictability, dynamics not easily analyzed in the simulator. The instability and resulting compromises in driving make it difficult to keep the tires in the right temperature window, further damaging the pace. The realization of these difficulties gives an idea of the challenge that the aspiring challengers to Red Bull face. Closing the performance gap is only part of the challenge, as the real difficulty will be doing it without losing the car’s balance.