Ferrari insists: new developments are arriving in Hungary, looking to 2024

Is there any good to save in this year’s Ferrari? The question continues to haunt the sleep of Cavallino fans. The disappointing race of Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz at Silverstone (ninth and tenth respectively) sparked criticism from detractors and from that part of enthusiasts who consider the SF-23 a mistaken design car, with no room for recovery. A sensation that also arose from the fact that the redhead had previously deceived with two promising performances in Canada and Austria. The ups and downs remained the constant of this tormented season, in spite of the large “packages” of aerodynamic innovations introduced along the way, in Spain and then in Austria. The Hungarian GP is held on Sunday, with the same doubts as always, even if the tortuous circuit on the outskirts of Budapest has historically been a friend of the reds in recent years, just remember the victory of Sebastian Vettel in 2015 and the Vettel-Raikkonen double of 2017.

three problems

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There is no doubt that the 2023 Ferrari was not very effective, as shown by the driver and constructor rankings, and that the improvements were not so evident, despite the “numbers” collected by the engineers when the various developments were introduced. The work carried out by the Maranello technicians focused on three macro problems: jumping (the “porpoising”), tire degradation, traction. The changes introduced starting from the Spanish GP, where the SF-23 adopted new sloping sides and a modified bottom, provided the desired benefits only for the first and third problems. While the degradation has been reduced but not eliminated. The Silverstone race was confirmation: in fact, the Ferrari engineers themselves feared degradation with the softer compounds. In England the SF-23 had no updates compared to the previous week and in qualifying the performance was in line with the simulations, while in the race an excess of prudence (read lack of confidence) was paid for in the choice of tires precisely due to fears their degradation.

laboratory

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However, the current Ferrari shouldn’t be considered a bankrupt single-seater or one to be “scrapped” on the altar of next season’s car project. And there is at least one good reason to support it. The development of the SF-23, despite not having achieved an acceptable consistency of performance, has in fact made it possible to reduce the gap on Red Bull compared to the beginning of the season, as team principal Frédéric Vasseur has repeatedly underlined, paving the way for the solutions that will be adopted on next year’s car. Among these certainly the adoption of a different geometry of the suspensions, in particular the front one. It was not possible to modify it during the current season, both for reasons of cost and time, since increasing the anti-sinking effect (replicating the functioning of the Red Bull) would have implied the need to build a new chassis and homologate it, with significant impact on the “budget cap”. This was one of the major limitations in the development of the current car.

future project

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New suspensions would have improved the dynamic balance and contributed to gaining downforce on the car, with positive effects on less tire degradation. A greater consistency in the performance of the car would have been obtained with each compound used in the race, being able to adopt much less conservative strategies. The Budapest layout, which requires high aerodynamic load and therefore maximum incidence of the wings, seems – from Ferrari simulations – to be able to make the DRS more effective, approaching that of Red Bull. According to our sources, Ferrari should try a new version of the diffuser, in view of the next race at Spa-Francorchamps in Belgium, where the Sprint format will reduce free practice to just one session with less space for experiments. In any case, this development too will constitute a further step in defining the aerodynamic concept of the 2024 car, called upon to take a big step forward to get closer to Red Bull and return to fight for victory.