Ferrari have signed a new aerodynamicist from Mercedes as they look to press home their advantage in 2022.
New technical regulations have been introduced this year, meaning that designers and engineers have had to adopt an entirely new philosophy to extract maximum performance from the cars.
The Scuderia spent much of last year developing for this season before the changes came into effect, while Red Bull and Mercedes needed to place an emphasis on 2021 as they battled for the championship.
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Ferrari claimed five podiums between Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc throughout the entirety of last season, and they have already matched that in the first three races of 2022 while winning as many races so far this year as they had done in the three seasons previous.
This is thanks to the brilliance of championship leader Charles Leclerc, whose two victories in Bahrain and Australia arrived either side of a second-placed finish in Saudi Arabia.
Such a monumental improvement this year has materialised through the relentless efforts of the existing workforce at Maranello as well as acquisitions of staff from other teams, including those that played an integral role in Mercedes’ eight years of constructors’ dominance.
One of those now is Gianluca Romani, whose education in the engineering field has taken him to Arizona, Valencia and Milan – 153 miles west of his birthplace in San Martino di Lupari.
He joined Mercedes as a graduate in 2019 and, after two successful years in Brackley, was taken on as a full-time aerodynamicist midway through last season.
He returned to his homeland to team up with the Maranello squad at the start of this month.
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“I’m happy to share that I’m starting a new position as Aerodynamicist at Ferrari,” he posted on LinkedIn.
Red Bull adviser Dr Helmut Marko previously claimed that the poaching of some Mercedes team members by his own side will likely have caused “some difficulties” for the Silver Arrows, who have made a sluggish start to the 2022 season as they try to resolve the issues posed by the ground effect aerodynamics.