Vanja #66 wrote: ↑04 Jul 2023, 19:35
LM10 wrote: ↑04 Jul 2023, 16:02
It surely will be interesting to see if they keep the classic Venturi floor. I'm far away from being an expert, but I've the feeling it would be their only realistic way to beat RBR anytime soon. I don't think RBR will be beaten with their own weapons - they've been fine tuning this concept for 1.5 years now and will continue doing it so in the next years.
So if Ferrari manages to make their current concept floor work in a balanced way and improve their race pace this way, we might have a proper title fight in hand for next year or the year after. It might sound optimistic, but we know how quickly things can change when a team finally starts unlocking the potential of the car, which has not been the case for Ferrari until recently.
What would you do - abandon the classic Venturi floor or stick to the concept?
I think they will be better off if they stick to their own floor development path. I believe they have a lot of room for improvement in various areas of the floor, but need to work further on suspension to keep it lower at the start of the race. Another point too - should they choose to go with elongated sidepod inlets like RB (a path they seem to have now taken) and move the SIS tube to the floor, they will reduce the chassis drag a bit. This will allow them to run more wing(s) and end up with about the same drag as they now have, so that could be some amount of extra downforce.
I also think that sticking to their own development path and trying to make the car work will provide higher winning chances in the future. There must be huge room for improvement from suspension work alone, as you've hinted at.
I've got the feeling Ferrari are of the same opinion, given they've not changed the floor philosophy despite bringing upgrades this season. One would assume they might have done it already instead of spending money on the current design.
Vasseur said they're already working on next year's car (live everyone else of course), "trying to correct the direction" - whatever that means. We'll see.