F1 2025 Spanish (Circuit de Catalunya) Pre-Race Thread

Last time we won there was in 2013...

It’s been so long since Ferrari won in Spain, I’m starting to think it was just a myth—like Atlantis, or consistent strategy calls.



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One should be able to use 2 hands to count passes here at least.

 

Hot this weekend coming up. Not good news for Mercedes 28C+ all weekend.

 

The most anticipated change of the year - will it matter at all........

What you should know about F1's flexi-wing clampdown at Spanish GP
https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/everything-you-need-to-know-f1-new-flexi-wing-rules-spanish-gp/

--Formula 1’s Spanish Grand Prix marks the start of a potential reset in the pecking order as the first race where new tests to clamp down on flexible front wings are in force.

Flexing bodywork has become a major talking point in F1 again over the last year or so, amid McLaren’s rise to being the benchmark team.

While McLaren has insisted that front and rear wing aeroelasticity has not been the silver bullet, Red Bull and Ferrari have been vocal critics of what they perceived to be flexi-wing tricks that had gone too far.

The FIA has looked into the matter extensively, making gradual revisions to the tests that police flexible bodywork at the front and rear of the car - including informing teams over the winter that, having initially intended to leave the rules alone in 2025, more changes were coming after all.

And at Barcelona, teams will need to comply with new tests that - according to some - could shake things up throughout the grid.

“We are working on it for ages now,” said Ferrari boss Fred Vasseur in Monaco last weekend.

“This can be a gamechanger for everybody because we don't know the impact on every single team of the new regulation.

“We will be focused on this to have better exploitation of the front wing.”

What the new tests are
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The new tests relate to how the F1 technical regulations police front wing bodywork flexibility.

When testing for excessive flexing, a load of up to 100N is applied in a downward direction at two points along the wing.

Until the Spanish GP, vertical deflection up to 15mm was permitted when the load is applied symmetrically to both sides of the car, and up to 20mm when applied to only one side.

This changes as of Wednesday, May 28, taking 5mm off each total: so the vertical deflection must be no more than 10mm when the load is applied symmetrically to both sides of the car, and no more than 15mm when the load is applied to only one side.

There is a further test that takes place on the front wing flap. Until Spain, the rules were that any part of the trailing edge of any front wing flap may deflect no more than 5mm when measured along the loading axis, with a 60N point load applied.

This is to be reduced to no more than 3mm from Wednesday, May 28.

Why’s this happening?
The FIA began an exercise from last year’s Belgian GP to monitor more closely what teams were doing on this front.

However, it said several times that it did not see anything untoward from its observation, and the FIA’s single-seater head, Nikolas Tombazis, originally said that the governing body was reluctant to rush through any changes to the technical regulations for 2025.

So when the tightening up of an existing technical directive emerged in January this year, after the FIA revised its position around last December, that was clearly a U-turn.

The FIA said it was attempting to draw a conclusive line under the flexi-wing arguments and “committed to ensure that bodywork flexibility is no longer a point of contention for the 2025 season”.

It argued that a “phased approach allows teams to adapt without the need to discard existing components unnecessarily”, although some were unhappy that the change was made in-season as it gave anyone utilising greater flexibility one-third of the season to keep benefitting.

The FIA also changed the rear wing regulations for the start of the season to try to eliminate so-called 'mini-DRS' effects, then beefed up those tests further immediately after the opening round in Australia.

Asked about what changed from his previous position that the tests would stay the same in 2025, Tombazis explained at round two in China: “With the benefit of hindsight, I would have rather not said that.

"After the season, we analysed all the data we had gathered with the cameras and so on, and we felt that the trend was that these deflections would continue to increase a lot.

"We felt that we could end up in the middle of the season with fairly large deformations and again, a lot of complaints and pressures and so on.

"So we felt, rather than wait for the middle of the season and so on, let's try to act a bit more decisively early on."

Why it’s significant
The two main reasons this matters are related. Flexible bodywork confers significant performance advantages; the longer someone has invested in exploring this area, the bigger the edge they will have.

So, cutting back what’s possible should level the playing field for anyone that was slow to exploit flexi-wings and/or was not exploiting it to the extent of others.

This is why Ferrari and Red Bull have been the most vocal proponents of the clampdown, and at the other of the grid Sauber has described it as a significant performance differentiator.

A flexible front wing can be particularly beneficial in the current ground-effect rules era.

The cars generate more downforce at high speed and it’s not just the floor: the front wing works in ground effect too, and can become too powerful as it gets pulled closer to the ground. Mercedes technical director James Allison once explained: “That tends to make a car get more nervous as it goes faster, because proportionately more is moving to the front axle than you might wish. And the more you find downforce near the ground, the worse that gets.”

So, the cars ideally need less wing to help avoid oversteer at high-speed. But too little wing and the car is not responsive in the slow corners - where the current cars tend to have understeer.

A flexible front wing that bends under load confers the advantage of backing off on straights and at high speed, therefore producing less downforce in fast corners, before ‘snapping back’ into position under braking to provide more downforce where it’s needed in slow corners.

It is, theoretically, the ideal mechanism to help balance out the traits of the ground-effect era cars.

Will it have an impact?
Naturally, if the advantage of flexible bodywork is as significant in reality as in theory, any team exploiting it more than another will suffer if it has to reduce what it is doing.

At the same time, anyone who was previously behind the curve now has the chance to get back on level pegging (or do a better job), getting the front wing to flex as much as possible while passing the new tests.

But what is the reality? That’s actually hard to tell. Some teams will say that this will have a big impact. Others expect very little difference - McLaren, for example, is adamant that flexing front wings are not the secret of its success and the new rules for Spain will not hold it back.

As teams have had notice of this since the winter, it’s possible that some have been running front wing designs in anticipation of the new tests. However, TV footage of various cars - including the Red Bull - makes it clear that there is a lot of flexing going on.

That will continue, because complete front wing rigidity is neither possible nor the intention, it is more a question of how different it is to before, how much it impacts different teams, and what (if any) impact there is on car characteristics, tyre usage and overall performance as a result.

“It’s essentially a regulation change,” said Horner.

“Maybe that will have zero impact on the running order, but it’s a change, and it will affect all the teams – maybe neutrally, but there will be an impact from it.”

 

If you have seen the analysis of the "rear flexi wings" that will be meaningless!! The flex occurs at the outer edges or along the bottom.

That graphic actually indicates more flex allowable on the front wing! Shorter lever arm, more displacement!

 

Gary Anderson: Why flexi-wing change could hurt Red Bull + Ferrari
https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/gary-anderson-why-flexi-wing-change-could-hurt-red-bull-ferrari/

How many Formula 1 teams will head to Barcelona for the Spanish Grand Prix on a 'wing' and a prayer?

The reduction in the amount of flexibility permitted in the FIA's front wing tests kicks in and will undoubtedly hurt some teams more than others. The question is, who could lose out and who might gain?

The rationale for the value of pursuing, and in some cases maximising, front wing flexing is clear. When the wing is in its starting position, it generates more front grip at lower speeds. That's important because these long, heavy cars commonly understeer more than the drivers want. But as the wing angle backs off at higher speed, then the centre of pressure (CoP) moves rearward, giving more stability in fast corners.

Why not use more front wing angle to reduce the understeer, I hear you ask? Yes, that would help in slow- and medium-speed corners, but would also end up pitching you into the barrier at high speed. Running less front wing increases the understeer in slow- and medium-speed turns, but gives you a more stable car in the high speed. Both of these will, at a minimum, sap laptime, if not throw you at the wall.

In general, this low speed to high speed balance problem is exaggerated with the weight of these current cars, but for some teams it is also self-inflicted. These ground effect cars increase the underfloor downforce dramatically as they get closer to the ground so, if you have the CoP of the underfloor itself just that bit further forward than another team, then as that downforce increases it has more effect on the front of the car than on the rear of the car. This makes the car nervous in fast corners. When I say "just that little bit", I'm talking perhaps 5-10cm further forward.

So the quantity of front wing flex that each team needs to generate to create a more stable aerodynamic balance between low and high speed will vary. Therefore this change will affect some teams more than others.

To get an idea of where each team stands, I have taken a close look at their front wing packages from the last conventional track, Imola. The more load you produce from the front wing, the further rearward the CoP of the underfloor will be. The further outboard you load the wing, then the more rotational flex you will get.

Here's how the front wing flexibility test works, using an Aston Martin front wing to demonstrate it. The test is about the amount a front wing that sweeps rearward as it goes outboard bends.

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Its outer chord section (A) is behind its inner chord section (B). The load for the deflection test can be carried out on either of the positions marked X.

The wing angle adjuster highlighted with the green ellipse is in close proximity to those outboard load test positions. This means that all four wing elements help to distribute the load.

With this style of delta wing design which is defined in the regulations, you should be able to play tunes on the amount of flexing using the carbonfibre weave and the carbon unidirectional material orientation in the front two elements. It is those two elements that must withstand the bending or torsional loads generated from this test.

The woven material, which is simply, as it says, woven, is what we normally see as an outer skin. It will withstand loads in all directions and protect the main structure from stone damage.

The unidirectional material, or UD as it's more commonly called, withstands huge tension loads, so when placed in the correct orientation to react to the loads created by the test the quantity of UD will increase or reduce the deflection.

To show what I mean about using UD, I have illustrated what I would call a simple layup: red lines on the second element, black lines on the most forward element. This material in tension is very stiff and you could play tunes on the overall wing stiffness by altering the direction, quantity and to some extent the quality of the material used. Then you simply cover it all to tie it together and protect it from stone damage with the woven carbon.

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The yellow arrow highlights the area where we the viewers see the wing deflection taking place. The inner part is rigidly attached to the nose, while the two rear flaps outboard of that yellow arrow are only supported by the adjuster inside the green ellipse.

Now, let’s take a close look at the front wings of the top four championship contenders to understand how this technical directive may or may not impact them.

McLaren
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Based on what we can see, McLaren runs as much if not more front wing frontal area than any other team. This likely means that the CoP of the underfloor is further rearward than others, which should give it a more consistent aerodynamic balance across the corner speed range.

It also means a small reduction in wing angle across the area that I have highlighted with the yellow and green lines. This will give a greater CoP shift rearward, so not only is the car more inherently aerodynamically stable, but McLaren will also get a bigger benefit from less deflection.

The yellow line shows the area on the rear flap where McLaren is running a Gurney flap. A Gurney flap generates more low-speed grip than you would achieve by just adding front wing angle. The green line just in front of the tyre is the area where McLaren is not using a Gurney flap.

The red line is the stagnation point where the airflow will separate. The airflow below it will travel underneath the wing, the airflow above it will travel over the top of the wing - with some of that flow that is going over the top being pulled through the slot gaps between the elements at very high speed. These will be positioned along the chord of the wing where the flow is getting a bit lazy to reduce the risk of the airflow traveling underneath suffering from separation problems.

All that, together with the high levels of anti-dive and anti-lift to control the rake of the car under braking and having the CoP of the underfloor further rearward, will still be beneficial.

I don't foresee any major design changes required and if McLaren does need to stiffen the front wing, it will be a minor change compared to some others.


Red Bull
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Red Bull has more shape to the trailing edge of the rearmost flap than McLaren. The green line shows this, and the fact that Red Bull is not using a Gurney flap also means like Mercedes it is not struggling for front downforce. Also, the front wing shape drops off faster going outboard.

This will mean for the same angular deflection (wing angle backing off) it will have more CoP shift rearwards because it's producing more of its front downforce from that increased chord length halfway between the inner edge of the tyre and the side of the chassis.

The central section, where the most forward element started the season connected to the underside of the nose, is now detached. The change of height to the lower section of the mainplane in this area is a little aggressive for my liking and that increased chord length I mentioned above could very easily encourage crossflow, which can have a major effect on the airflow to the central section of the underfloor.

However, to counter that this does give Red Bull a slot gap between the nose and most forward wing element, which improves the mass flow to the leading edge of the underfloor when the front wing is close to the track surface under braking.

If you keep chasing higher levels of downforce from the underfloor, which I believe Red Bull has been doing, the temptation is to move the CoP of the underfloor forward. This means you have a longer distance of low pressure between the throat of the underfloor and the trailing edge of the diffuser.

I don't think this change in front wing deflection will do Red Bull any favours. It might just make the car a bit harder to get balanced.

Ferrari
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The yellow line indicates the area where Ferrari runs a Gurney flap. The green line outboard is without a Gurney flap, making it very similar in this area to McLaren.

The red highlight line is the stagnation point on the front mainplane, the intersection to the lowest point is more sympathetic so less chance of transverse airflow. All in all, it's a tidy wing package and the fact it runs a Gurney on the trailing edge shows Ferrari is still searching for front downforce, especially in slow corners.

I’m pretty sure Ferrari's problems lie in the underfloor. At Monaco, it was in a pretty good place but Monaco is the one track where everyone needs to run a slightly higher ride height. This takes away any peaky underfloor downforce, so I would expect its problems to return at Barcelona.

To get a decent performance from the overall car at a more conventional circuit, Ferrari seems to need to run the car lower, so it appears to be very ride-height critical. If so, Ferrari might just suffer a little more in the high-speed corners than most if it has to run a stiffer front wing.
Conclusion
I suspect any changes that the teams have had to implement for Barcelona will have been run at Imola - that is despite several teams saying they will again have changes for Barcelona.

No team would just head to a track with a major change (if they had to) without getting some idea of what effect it might have on the car performance. Is that why Mercedes and Ferrari look like they were struggling just that little bit more at Imola?

The other thing is that sometimes it is very easy to trick yourself, as having a flexing front wing is fine only as long as it flexes on track correctly and you understand it. Sometimes, these sorts of things just confuse teams when you are chasing the set-up, so that could actually help any team that needs to stiffen its front wing.

 

Looks like a medieval torture rig

 

Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!

 

Confess!

 

“Cardinal Fang? Cardinal Fang!”

“Sorry, m’lord (Joe Bauer). I was just having a cup of tea with these architects (engineers).”

 

LOL!!!

 

McLaren trialled Spanish GP stiffer F1 front wing in Imola, shrugs off flexi-wing impact

McLaren is shrugging off suggestions it will be affected by the Spanish Grand Prix's flexi-wing clampdown, as Autosport can reveal the team has already trialled its stiffer wing to good effect in Imola.

 

I am very curious about this weekend on which teams might have a change in performance. Not only is there a significant TD coming into place, it's also a very common race for teams to bring updates.

If McLaren's advantage truly comes from controlling tire temps, then I don't expect to see them losing their edge, at least in race conditions. I wonder if they may lose their efficiency advantage that affects their outright speed though.

Since most teams are separated by just a tenth or two, it is possible we could see the grid order change a little bit. Though I am sure all the teams would have found loopholes in the test procedure that allows them to still flex as much as possible. So maybe it does very very little to affect the teams.

 

Supposedly Ferrari is bringing entirely new front and rear wings this weekend, so the analysis of their wings above may be totally obsolete.

 

George Russell’s Monaco Grand Prix was undone in qualifying when his W16 lost power and coasted to a standstill in the tunnel, his session over with the driver languishing in 14th place.

Mercedes team representative Bradley Lord has revealed Mercedes have not only identified the issue, a wiring loom that short-circuited, but they’re also examining all the others engines in the pool to ensure there’s no repeat of the failure.

 

At the end of the Spanish GP the season will all but officially be over. The wings introduced this weekend have been mandated, they are not team designed investments in being more competetive. Looking at the following 16 races, all the teams are stopping work on the 2025 cars and spending their money on the 2026 models. Drivers will spend more sim time on next years cars than on this. And when all the teams show up for the first race in 2026, they will have little to no idea of what their cars will do. This is the total farce that is now F1.