According to the FIA's early simulations, a 2022 car would retain 86 percent of its downforce while one car length behind another.
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According to Mercedes‘ trackside engineering chief Andrew Shovlin, the new Formula One cars in 2022 should allow for overtaking opportunities that were previously unavailable. For 2022, the technical regulations have been overhauled with the goal of having cars that produce less dirty air and are less sensitive to the wake created when following another vehicle. It is hoped that this will allow drivers to follow each other more closely, resulting in better racing. According to the FIA’s early simulations, a 2022 car would retain 86 percent of its downforce while one car length behind another, compared to 55 percent for current cars.
While this is unlikely to reflect the final cars built by the teams, Shovlin believes the rules will improve the amount of racing between drivers. “One of the big questions that the fans are going to want to know the answer to is are these cars going to give us better racing,” he said in Mercedes’ latest internally produced video previewing the new rules.
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“They should certainly be improved. A huge amount of effort has gone into these regulations, so that the car in front doesn’t disrupt the airflow for the following car. That will allow the driver to stay closer and the closer you can get the more likely you are to be able to overtake.”
“Will it make a track like Monaco an overtaking circuit? In reality, that’s quite unlikely. The straights are too short, the track’s too narrow. There really isn’t any easy place around Monaco to overtake. But what we’ll probably see at lots of the other circuits is that you can follow more closely, you can put the car ahead under pressure, it’s easier to get within an undercut range.”
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“And importantly, there will be straights now where hopefully you can make a passing manoeuvre stick, whereas previously it wouldn’t have been practical.
So, all of that will start to get a flavour for it in Barcelona, in Bahrain. But really, it will only be when the lights go out for that first race that we’ll know whether this project has been successful in that very specific regard,” Shovlin added.
