One of the key themes of the pre-season test in Barcelona was undoubtedly the aggressive manner in which the cars seemed to bounce up and down along the straight, and there is speculation that this may be cause for concern for some of the teams.
Not least of those was Ferrari, and a slow-motion video of Charles Leclerc’s car shaking his head around the cockpit made for slightly nauseating viewing.
However, team principal Mattia Binotto insists that the team looked at the issue, and have solved it.
“On the bouncing, I think it was an issue but it’s not any more,” he told reporters on Friday – the last day of the first test.
“Somehow we are managing the situation.”
The obvious presumption is that the all-new technical regulations imposed ahead of the 2022 season – featuring ground effect-led aerodynamics – have provided obstacles such as the “porpoising” issue many drivers have experienced.
But the Italian has reassured fans that, throughout the three days, the issue subsided significantly.
“If we’re looking at this on Thursday afternoon and earlier on Friday, I think we are bouncing a lot less,” he added.
All told, the Scuderia completed 438 laps between Carlos Sainz and Leclerc, with the Monegasque also topping day two in what appeared a very promising start to the year.
Binotto is pleased with the progress made in Spain, and now have a lot of information to work with ahead of the second test in Bahrain.
“We are happy, first because I think we have done a lot of laps. We have learned from the car, collecting data,” he explained.
“But I think if you look at the performance of the lap time it is too early days,” he cautioned, not wanting to allow expectations to get ahead of them at this point.
“We are not running all in the same conditions, and I am expecting other cars to be very fast.
“More for us was to be consistent running, and really try to collect as much data as we could,” he explained. “There are still a lot of issues to address or potential to extract.
“We will be back in Maranello before to go to Bahrain and we have a few days really to look at all the data and try somehow to optimise the current car.”
The Maranello outfit, who ended the 2021 Constructors’ Championship third, are said to have overcome the power deficit that comes with the new fuel blend that will be used in 2022, while scepticism remains over whether their aero package will prove competitive.