The new regulations for this season have arguably been a huge step forward in regard to close racing and entertainment; however, there have already been some huge flaws in the aerodynamic dramatic changes.
The biggest flaw of them all has been the porpoising phenomena, which has caused mechanical bouncing due to the more rigid ride-height, rake and suspension designs.
In simpler terms, the cars are sucking more air underneath them now rather than over the top.
This is therefore pulling them closer to the ground, which for some teams has caused the floor of the car to bounce against the track surface.
READ: Max Verstappen told ‘he can play with Charles Leclerc’
Seeing the cars porpoise has been painful to watch, with drivers such as Pierre Gasly and Sir Lewis Hamilton having complained and raised concerns of the ramifications for the drivers who experience the phenomena.
After the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, which saw the worst porpoising of the season so far, Gasly explained that unless something is done to stop the bouncing, drivers would need walking sticks in their 30s.
Hamilton arguably needed one after the race in Baku, where the porpoising he experienced was so aggressive that he was seen visibly struggling to get out of his W13, having suffered from spinal pain throughout the race.
The Mercedes F1 Team called for the FIA to intervene and to introduce new rules to eliminate the issue, something that became even more pressing when the German team supplied data showing that porpoising can in fact cause brain damage.
With drivers health being absolutely vital, the FIA announced that a Technical Directive will be introduced.
It was initially set for the French Grand Prix but will now be implemented at the upcoming Belgian Grand Prix.
Starting from Spa, the FIA will introduce a metric to analyse the intensity of vertical oscillations experienced by drivers.
The teams have been given a range they must keep within, a failure to do so will most likely result in a penalty.
It gives teams some freedom on how low they wish to run their cars, something which has been praised by Scuderia AlphaTauri team principal Franz Tost.
Tost thinks the FIA have reacted very well to porpoising, with it now up to the teams to stick to the limits.
“From the regulation side, I think that FIA is doing a good job,” Tost told GPFans.
“It’s not so easy when teams are using safety for regulation changes, because of this bouncing and so on, the FIA reacted quite good.
“Now we have the metric, they came up with a technical directive. Teams know now exactly what the limit are.
“They have to stay within this. Now it’s up to the teams to sort it out that the cars are not bouncing in a way that the drivers are not able to have everything under control.”
Porpoising hasn’t been the only issue in 2022, with the reduced budget cap but increased running costs having made some teams concerned that they’ll have no choice but to miss some races.
This year’s budget gap is $140 million, $5 million lower than last season.
Tost again praised the FIA for how they’ve dealt with the rapid rise in costs across the world, with inflation being one of the largest, as the team boss explained that a “good compromise” was found at the Austrian Grand Prix.
“The FIA did a good job because all the teams struggled a lot with the increase of the costs, especially with the inflation rate where we lost a lot of money then the logistic costs increased dramatically,” explained Tost.
READ: Alex Albon fires accusation at Red Bull as he defends being outperformed by Max Verstappen
“Also, energy-wise, it’s nearly three times of the budget which we originally calculated.
“Therefore, the meeting which we had in Austria was very successful. We found a good compromise, which means that none of the teams is 100 percent happy, but all the teams can live with this solution.
“I think that this was a good job from the financial department of the FIA, because it was not an easy one.”