The new changes introduced by the Federation last week will officially take effect over the Miami weekend.
After a long month of anticipation, Formula 1 finally returns with the Miami Grand Prix, the fourth round of the season. The American weekend promises to be particularly anticipated, as the new changes introduced by the Federation last week will officially take effect. Industry insiders are eager to understand what these changes will entail and how they will impact the cars’ performance over the Miami Sprint weekend.
Mark Temple, McLaren’s director of engineering, attempted to provide some insights into what could happen in Florida, using graphs developed by the British team. Here are his detailed statements: “The effect of the new rules is limited, a few tenths at most. It also depends somewhat on the circuit. In qualifying, as we saw in the example, it stems partly from the loss of some deployment on the straights.”
Temple then added, analyzing what could change over the course of the race: “During the race, we’ll also have a reduced power level in areas of the track that don’t include a straight-mode zone, so we’ll lose some lap time there. However, in those same areas, we’ll use a little less energy, which will then be used elsewhere. So we’re talking about [a loss of] two or three tenths, but it depends on the track.”
With the introduction of the new rules, top speeds and overtaking will also change, with electric cars managing things differently. Here’s Temple: “Let’s take the area between turns 1 and 4. If you used the boost, with the previous rules you would have achieved a very significant increase in top speed, as shown in orange; by reducing power from 350 to 250 kW, you instead get the green curve. Therefore, overtaking becomes more difficult in those areas. And that’s precisely the goal: if there’s no straight-mode zone, then that’s not a suitable spot for overtaking.
The other change applies everywhere: now, if you activate the boost later, that is, when the power peaks at the beginning of the straight and then starts to decrease, previously, by pressing the boost button, you immediately returned to the full 350 kW. Now, however, that value is reduced: either you maintain the power level you dropped to, or, if you find yourself below 150 kW, the power goes back up to 150 kW. I think we’ll see fewer opportunistic overtaking moves at unusual points on the track, but I think it’s the right compromise in terms of safety. On the main straight, however, the impact will be largely irrelevant.”
Photo: McLaren F1 Team
