Ferrari is concentrating on the efficiency within the qualifying periods so as to have the ability to enhance its total outcomes. On the finish of the Jeddah race weekend, Ferrari workforce principal Frederic Vasseur noticed that the workforce wanted to give attention to enhancing its personal efficiency with the intention to begin additional forward on the grid. He defined that when this purpose is achieved, the race modifications completely, with the potential to realize six or seven seconds within the first 5 or 6 laps as a substitute of dropping time. The efficiency hole between Saturday and Sunday stems from the aerodynamic idea of the SF-25, however that doesn’t imply there isn’t any 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 Group Principal said 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 brisker than the main duo within the last 20 laps. Nonetheless, it’s telling that after 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. The same dynamic was noticed within the comparability with Mercedes every week earlier on the Bahrain Worldwide Circuit, on a monitor and floor which might be the exact opposite of the Saudi Arabian one.
The general image exhibits a really aggressive Ferrari when it comes to race situations, unable, nevertheless, to specific its tempo whereas caught in soiled air. Therefore Frederic Vasseur’s push to focus efforts on Saturday efficiency: the French supervisor said 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 dropping a few seconds within the first 5 or 6 laps and likewise emphasised the significance of being extra constant all through the complete 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 almost the complete lap, dropping all three and a half tenths in simply the primary two corners. Within the race, as soon as he discovered himself in clear air throughout the first stint, the Monegasque matched Max Verstappen’s occasions within the first sector simply earlier than the cease. This variation of scene exhibits how the qualifying hole largely stemmed from tyre preparation, whose significance was additionally highlighted by the four-time Components 1 world champion. In his last 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 additionally from higher tyre readiness in flip 1 after complaining about it simply minutes earlier.
It’s truthful to marvel why Ferrari doesn’t attempt to velocity up the preparation lap to heat the tyres higher. Nonetheless, it isn’t only a matter of heating them up, however a broader problem associated to compound exploitation. On the identical monitor, for instance, in 2024, Charles Leclerc tried the double prep lap method, however was nonetheless quicker with a single warm-up lap, although the tyre was not but in its optimum window. Ferrari’s downside shouldn’t be heating the tyres, however extracting grip from the compound. The problem isn’t just to convey the tyre in rapidly, however to stabilize it as properly, 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 progressively develop into a real artwork. As Simone Berra, Pirelli’s Chief Engineer, defined the earlier 12 months, 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 situations 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 masses 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 all the things have been the 37 levels celsius on monitor in Q3, and particularly the mix of a really tender compound with notably clean monitor floor, a mixture that shrinks the tyre’s grip peak into a particularly slender working window. All this made it very straightforward to overheat the tyre by the top of the lap, requiring a cautious method 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. In the course of the presentation of the SF-25 single-seater, the Frenchman defined that tyre administration is carefully linked not solely to the automotive itself but additionally to the best way the human aspect interacts with it, describing it as a captivating mix of each areas. In Maranello, suspension setups might be studied to assist the tyre work higher over a single lap, however, as Adrian Newey reminds us, the setup is commonly complementary to the traits of the automotive’s idea.
Additional room for enchancment lies within the driving throughout 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 might be vital, with which groups are nonetheless taking their first steps. The Jeddah weekend marked solely the second outing of the C5 compound this season, which can 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, unending course of, whether or not it includes long-distance administration or extracting better efficiency over a single lap. The Ferrari technical director famous that they continue learning, 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 type.
Qualifying struggles aren’t only a tyre problem, 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 vehicles to trip top, a facet 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 method to optimizing the automotive’s efficiency. The British engineer famous that because of this the hierarchy among the many vehicles tends to shift barely when shifting from qualifying to the race.
Engineers typically repeat that the best way the automotive strikes in relation to the bottom modifications fully between qualifying and race, each attributable to gasoline load and, above all, attributable to 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 gasoline tank. Jock Clear noticed that in some corners, a automotive’s competitiveness could fluctuate relying on the quantity of gasoline onboard and whether or not it’s throughout qualifying or the race.
Subsequently, efficiency over a single lap additionally relies 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 trip 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 attainable by means of aerodynamic updates. This, nevertheless, will rely on how lengthy Ferrari considers it worthwhile to proceed growing the present mission earlier than shifting all assets to the 2026 Components 1 automotive.
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