F1 explains process to delivering more "raceable" 2022 cars

Formula 1

F1 explains process to delivering more "raceable" 2022 cars

F1 will race to radically new regulations this year

Ian Parkes & Sam Hall

Monday 10 January 2022 08:30 Updated: 11:15

F1 managing director, motorsports, Ross Brawn has explained how the sport approached the creation of the all-new aerodynamics for the coming season.

The sport will race to a completely new set of aerodynamic regulations this year with a large focus being placed on improving the raceability of the cars.

One of the biggest issues plaguing action in recent times has been the amount of turbulent air created by aero components, reducing the downforce created by any car following another and adding to the difficulty of overtaking.

Speaking to the New York Times, Brawn explained the process followed by the five-man team led by Pat Symonds in fixing the problem.

"What has changed in aerodynamics in the last decade is the ability to simulate the aerodynamic behaviour of the cars," said Brawn.

"I would say a modern Formula 1 team is probably using computational fluid dynamics [CFD] more than it uses the empirical way of doing it which is a wind tunnel.

"They're using a combination, but the computational methods have become much more prominent.

"Our team was specialised in that area of analysis and development, so the first thing we did was to build a computational model of one car following another which had never been done before.

"With support from Amazon and other specialists, we were able to build these models and see the problem. We then set about, once we understood the problem and the causes of the problem, seeing how we could change the design of the cars to impact and reduce that sensitivity."

Explaining that CFD was a "fairly quick process" as models could be left "running overnight", Brawn revealed F1 had utilised the wind tunnel of a team in order to complete further evaluations.

Asked if he was able to name the team involved, Brawn answered: "No, but it's a very good wind tunnel, probably one of the best in Formula 1 at the moment, and we simply rented time in it and it was confidential.

"They didn't know what we were doing, as they do actually with other customers, so we were really just a customer on this."