Ferrari is concentrating on the efficiency within the qualifying periods so as to have the ability to enhance its general outcomes. On the finish of the Jeddah race weekend, Ferrari workforce principal Frederic Vasseur noticed that the workforce wanted to deal with enhancing its personal efficiency in an effort to begin additional forward on the grid. He defined that when this aim is achieved, the race modifications fully, with the potential to achieve six or seven seconds within the first 5 – 6 laps as an alternative of shedding time. The efficiency hole between Saturday and Sunday stems from the aerodynamic idea of the SF-25, however that doesn’t imply there is no such thing as a room for enchancment. The work on qualifying principally includes tyre preparation, drawing on the experience of the brand new technical director Loic Serra.
Good race tempo
On the 6.174-kilometre Jeddah Corniche Circuit, the Ferrari Staff Principal acknowledged that for 35 laps, Charles Leclerc was quicker than Oscar Piastri and Max Verstappen. Nonetheless, it was an uneven comparability, because the Ferrari driver had tyres 10 laps more energizing than the main duo within the ultimate 20 laps. Nonetheless, it’s telling that when he discovered clear air after George Russell’s pit cease, the Monegasque driver lowered his lap occasions within the first stint, even being two tenths quicker than Max Verstappen’s occasions on the finish of his stint. An identical dynamic was noticed within the comparability with Mercedes per week earlier on the Bahrain Worldwide Circuit, on a monitor and floor which can be the exact opposite of the Saudi Arabian one.
The general image reveals a really aggressive Ferrari by way of race circumstances, unable, nonetheless, to specific its tempo whereas caught in soiled air. Therefore Frederic Vasseur’s push to focus efforts on Saturday efficiency: the French supervisor acknowledged that they’d struggled extra in qualifying and wanted to focus on that side. He identified that ranging from fourth place meant being in soiled air, which led to shedding a few seconds within the first 5 – 6 laps and likewise emphasised the significance of being extra constant all through all the weekend.
The similarities between the SF-25, the graceful asphalt and the quick corners of Jeddah highlighted one other of Ferrari’s limitations. In qualifying, Charles Leclerc was on pole place tempo for practically all the lap, shedding all three and a half tenths in simply the primary two corners. Within the race, as soon as he discovered himself in clear air through the first stint, the Monegasque matched Max Verstappen’s occasions within the first sector simply earlier than the cease. This variation of scene reveals how the qualifying hole largely stemmed from tyre preparation, whose significance was additionally highlighted by the four-time System 1 world champion. In his ultimate Q3 lap, the Dutchman improved his first sector by three tenths in comparison with the earlier try, benefiting from Yuki Tsunoda’s slipstream and monitor evolution, but in addition from higher tyre readiness in flip 1 after complaining about it simply minutes earlier.
It’s honest to marvel why Ferrari doesn’t attempt to velocity up the preparation lap to heat the tyres higher. Nonetheless, it’s not only a matter of heating them up, however a broader concern associated to compound exploitation. On the identical monitor, for instance, in 2024, Charles Leclerc tried the double prep lap approach, however was nonetheless quicker with a single warm-up lap, although the tyre was not but in its optimum window. Ferrari’s downside just isn’t heating the tyres, however extracting grip from the compound. The problem isn’t just to deliver the tyre in shortly, however to stabilize it as effectively, with out overheating it over the remainder of the lap.
The artwork of tyre preparation
The Maranello engineers and technicians are due to this fact working to enhance what has step by step grow to be a real artwork. As Simone Berra, Pirelli’s Chief Engineer, defined the earlier yr, tyre preparation includes a compromise between preserving the rear steady and guaranteeing the entrance is straight away prepared for the primary sector. The Italian engineer famous that balancing each axles is considerably tougher in excessive ambient temperatures, whereas it turns into simpler in cooler circumstances and on circuits with many high-speed corners that help in warming up the tyres.
In Jeddah, the abundance of quick corners helped with tyre preparation, subjecting the tyres to principally lateral hundreds extra evenly distributed throughout the 4 wheels in comparison with the stress of braking or traction, which think about one of many two axles. Nonetheless, complicating every thing had been the 37 levels celsius on monitor in Q3, and particularly the mix of a really comfortable compound with notably easy monitor floor, a combination that shrinks the tyre’s grip peak into a particularly slim working window. All this made it very straightforward to overheat the tyre by the top of the lap, requiring a cautious strategy within the first few meters. Ferrari had a neater time within the race, exactly as a result of the used tyre, as soon as stabilized, may function throughout a wider temperature vary.
To enhance, Ferrari is counting on the experience of technical director Loic Serra, a tyre specialist. Throughout the presentation of the SF-25 single-seater, the Frenchman defined that tyre administration is intently related not solely to the automotive itself but in addition to the best way the human aspect interacts with it, describing it as an interesting mix of each areas. In Maranello, suspension setups will probably be studied to assist the tyre work higher over a single lap, however, as Adrian Newey reminds us, the setup is usually complementary to the traits of the automotive’s idea.
Additional room for enchancment lies within the driving through the warm-up lap, a way to be refined along with the drivers. To succeed, a greater understanding of the brand new 2025 Pirelli tire will probably be crucial, with which groups are nonetheless taking their first steps. The Jeddah weekend marked solely the second outing of the C5 compound this season, which is able to return in Miami, the place Ferrari hopes to see some progress. Loic Serra had already cautioned again in February that tyre work is a steady, endless course of, whether or not it includes long-distance administration or extracting larger efficiency over a single lap. The Ferrari technical director famous that they continue to learn, and the extra information they achieve, the extra they will apply it to automotive design, setup selections, and even changes to the motive force’s fashion.
Qualifying struggles are usually not only a tyre concern, because the SF-25 inherits from the 2024 automotive an aerodynamic idea geared toward race efficiency. It’s a consequence of the intense sensitivity of floor impact automobiles to experience top, a side that forces groups to decide on the optimum floor clearance for the ground. As Jock Clear, Ferrari’s Senior Efficiency Engineer, defined again in September, every workforce has its personal strategy to optimizing the automotive’s efficiency. The British engineer famous that this is the reason the hierarchy among the many automobiles tends to shift barely when shifting from qualifying to the race.
Engineers usually repeat that the best way the automotive strikes in relation to the bottom modifications fully between qualifying and race, each because of gas load and, above all, because of velocity. In a nook taken at 200 kilometers per hour in qualifying, going simply 10 kilometers per hour slower within the race can cut back downforce by 100 kilograms, which is the equal of a full gas tank. Jock Clear noticed that in some corners, a automotive’s competitiveness could fluctuate relying on the quantity of gas onboard and whether or not it’s throughout qualifying or the race.
Subsequently, efficiency over a single lap additionally will depend on the working level chosen for the SF-25 single-seater. The Ferrari technicians have room to regulate the setup, persevering with to work on the trade-off between experience top and suspension stiffness to attempt to extract extra efficiency from the ground in qualifying, so long as this doesn’t compromise tyre put on within the race. On paper, additional optimization can be potential by way of aerodynamic updates. This, nonetheless, will rely on how lengthy Ferrari considers it worthwhile to proceed growing the present challenge earlier than shifting all sources to the 2026 System 1 automotive.
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