2024 Scuderia Ferrari F1 Team

[f1316]

No need to feel nervous! Thank you for posting and contributing!

Imho this is a bit of Alonso showing how well he did by overemphasising the strength of the car just in front, mixed with the fact that Ferrari were genuinely very strong. I do think McLaren - Norris in particular - were a little stronger though.

I appreciate the welcome but my reffering to needing ‘courage’ was a naughty response to something DoctorRadio said in the Mclaren thread yesterday
Im a 12 year veteran really

Anyway, yes I too believe it was just Alonso massaging his ego after a fairly decent drive

Alonso will take a dig at Ferrari at every opportunity he gets. I'm sure you can find at least 4 articles on 4 different occasions this season alone where he has done said similar things.

Ok fair enough, I didn’t appreciate or understand the sarcasm, so took it at face value. Funnily enough 2012 was my first year on this forum too.

I think Alonso also has a “I could have won x more championships if I’d stayed at Ferrari” narrative in his head too, so I’m sure that’s part of it. The Ferrari was genuinely very fast in clear air though - 2nd and possibly 3rd as well should have been on the cards as Piastri didn’t look too special and Max had his struggles.

[scuderiabrandon]

I appreciate the welcome but my reffering to needing ‘courage’ was a naughty response to something DoctorRadio said in the Mclaren thread yesterday
Im a 12 year veteran really

Anyway, yes I too believe it was just Alonso massaging his ego after a fairly decent drive

Alonso will take a dig at Ferrari at every opportunity he gets. I'm sure you can find at least 4 articles on 4 different occasions this season alone where he has done said similar things.

Ok fair enough, I didn’t appreciate or understand the sarcasm, so took it at face value. Funnily enough 2012 was my first year on this forum too.

I think Alonso also has a “I could have won x more championships if I’d stayed at Ferrari” narrative in his head too, so I’m sure that’s part of it. The Ferrari was genuinely very fast in clear air though - 2nd and possibly 3rd as well should have been on the cards as Piastri didn’t look too special and Max had his struggles.

It was fast but it had an extremely narrow window of performance in qualy trim, unfortunately that is 90% of the job in Singapore. I personally believe we could have fought for victory had we started on the 1st or 2nd row but saying we were fastest is overemphasising to make himself feel better about the result. At best, we were as fast as McLaren in race trim and could've capitalized on Norris' mistakes to win the race.

However, do yourself a favour and look at the ease at which Norris took pole. A rather comfortable and pedestrian pole lap. I'm certain that car had at least 3 tenths of performance left in it qualy trim had he wringed it a bit more.

[CjC]

Interesting that you see it as a dig, I never looked at it that to be fair and now you mention it I think I can recall at least one occasion this season where Alonso was overly flattery towards Ferrari

[CjC]

Just out of interest what did happen to Leclerc in quali? I’m assuming he over pushed and went over a white line?

[dialtone]

Just out of interest what did happen to Leclerc in quali? I’m assuming he over pushed and went over a white line?

Cold front tires. -10C out of the pits.

[CjC]

Why didn’t he set a time though? Was he so far off the pace he just aborted the lap?

[Xyz22]

Why didn’t he set a time though? Was he so far off the pace he just aborted the lap?

He tried to do a top lap despite the tyres being out of optimal range -- > Locked up in the first corner and then got track limits.

[CjC]

I see, thanks. Plenty for him and Ferrari to evaluate over the next 4 weeks then.

[Xyz22]

I see, thanks. Plenty for him and Ferrari to evaluate over the next 4 weeks then.

Yeah, the quali was compromised before he even started the lap. With these tyres you can't afford to be out of the optimal range. Even 1-2 degrees and it's over.

[search]

The "best car all weekend" is still nonsense, though, to be honest. Ferrari was struggling to get the softs to work all Saturday.

[Emag]

The "best car all weekend" is still nonsense, though, to be honest. Ferrari was struggling to get the softs to work all Saturday.

It comes from the fact that Lando said after Friday that he didn't anticipate big improvement and that he was happy with the lap. Also said that if Leclerc wasn't happy with his lap he would be worried about the small gap. As it turned out Leclerc wasn't happy with the lap, so people were right to assume Ferrari probably was looking like the better package at that point.

Lando really likes to play himself as the underdog though. He could have been driving the F2004 20 years ago and he still would have found a way to make himself look like he was struggling before the actual race.

[search]

The "best car all weekend" is still nonsense, though, to be honest. Ferrari was struggling to get the softs to work all Saturday.

It comes from the fact that Lando said after Friday that he didn't anticipate big improvement and that he was happy with the lap. Also said that if Leclerc wasn't happy with his lap he would be worried about the small gap. As it turned out Leclerc wasn't happy with the lap, so people were right to assume Ferrari probably was looking like the better package at that point.

Lando really likes to play himself as the underdog though. He could have been driving the F2004 20 years ago and he still would have found a way to make himself look like he was struggling before the actual race.

To me, Ferrari looked better on Friday as well, but on Saturday McLaren made a bigger step. Norris' pole lap wasn't particularly good, but still not within reach, I'd think. Let alone a perfect lap.

[Vanja #66]

Sorry but it is catch 22. Last year we all complained about the tyre deg situation and the complete lack of race pace as a result of this.
We were getting poles but couldn’t hold them because the tyres would go away so quick.
There’s a balance, and MCL has it right in the sweet spot. Thats clear, and that’s ok. I don’t think Ferrari are too far away if I’m honest.

People complaining about lack of race pace, believing there's a fundamental degradation issue (like W15 has) and there actually being a fundamental degradation issue are two different things. There were 3 races where SF23 exhibited worse deg than RB19

-Bahrain, where they ran less downforce because new wing kept breaking
-Hungary, where I believe they messed up with setup (other hot races weren't an issue really)
-Monza, where Sainz had more deg in 1st stint because he wanted to keep P1 vs Max

Towards the end of the year, Leclerc often had longer stints on Mediums than Max and kept a very good pace on them. The car was limited with aero in several ways, suspension couldn't be set up to satisfy good ride height in both Q and R trim and it was altogether very peaky and had a small window for optimal floor performance. Deg was an issue very rarely and there was always something that contributed to it

[bananapeel23]

Vanja feel free to correct me if I'm just talking nonsense.

That's one of several valid explanations I see of events in the past period, bar several tiny details. I will skip on those as I'm not anywhere near knowledgable enough to discuss suspension detail, so I don't want to misslead anyone reading

However, pull rod vs push rod is typically mostly about aero and packaging. There is a feature of pull rod design, where you need to be careful of pull rod angle to horizontal plane, if it's too small you induce crazy amount of load in the rod. Even if it isn't, it can get more load than a push rod experiences in most cases. Other than that, both concepts have their well-known operation and packaging differences and details and the choice between the two does not necesarily influence any aspect of vehicle dynamics, if you've designed them both properly and taking into account all details. Also, pull rod sits lower in the tub, so it lowers CoG a tiny bit

Exactly. But I don't think they're pursuing a suspension redesign because they want the packaging advantages of the pull rod, they're just switching to pull rod because they're redesigning the entire thing anyway and might aswell switch to a slightly better aerodynamic setup while they're at it.

[Farnborough]

Related to this aspect, pull rod front suspension, AN interview in which he talks specifically about this design.

Quoted from memory .... the RB platform he is credited with that suspension, moved driver back as far as possible, resulting in engine located as far rearmost as could be arranged. Then front suspension subjected to the tub's cross section at that point to fit in competent front suspension.

He specifically said that he always wants the keel shape (like a boat) at that point for flow volume approaching floor and so that shape in this iteration would bring too much geometric compromise to push rod arrangement. Hence the pull rod design being primary as result of desirable flow at front end of chassis. Also adding that it benefits front brake duct design but not being specific about the gain from that component. Not said by him, but it looks and sounds like (as he elaborated on downstream aspect in talking about clearing wheel wake after this) this is trying to tidy the problematic wheel wake and move it out the side of chassis with as much power as possible.
Furthermore, he spoke of using high pressure effect underneath the leading part of sidepod entry to also eject "dirty" flow away from the chassis and out to side.
Sounds like he disagreed with putting sdepod entry under the pod top surface as it reduces the potency of that flow to enact cleaning of further downstream vehicle architecture. Thats my understanding of his description.

Equally, the move from pull rear on previous RB to push on this era, was to package the suspension into a now very much reduced gearbox space (remember that moving both driver and engine rearmost) while also keeping clear of where the gearbox drops down into diffuser area.

Effectively both front and rear are slaved to pure aero performance, and completely confirmed by his own description.

Interestingly, the McL (under James key, I believe) came to the same start point, and now with aero competency added seems quite productive.

Guessing that Ferrari are now looking and comparing those front end flow structures to give their design comparable scope as these two.