F1: Teams trying to claw back 1/2-second loss in performance

Alfa Romeo technical boss Jan Monchaux says aerodynamic rule changes for the 2023 F1 season that raise the car’s floor 15mm to help the incompetent teams, who can’t stop the porpoising on their own, have cost the cars about 1/2-second in performance.

Floor edges have been raised by 15mm; the diffuser throat height has been raised; the diffuser edge stiffness has been increased; and an additional sensor has been mandated to more effectively monitor the porpoising phenomenon.

“The rule change, came with, let’s call it half a second per lap time loss, which I think now we’ll assume is more or less plus minus a tenth the same everywhere,” explained Monchaux.

“I have no doubt that most of the teams will have recovered those losses.

“It’s a matter of how much more have you been able to put on to the car for the start of the season.

“But even more importantly for us, how much more you can put during the season because we started very strong last year and at some point struggled a bit more to also bring performance to the car.”

“If there’s one thing we also learned last year is that the season is not over until the last lap in Abu Dhabi because it’s the last lap where we finished P6 with, what, half a second ahead of [Aston Martin driver Sebastian] Vettel,” Monchaux said.

“And we had our highs, we had downs but also, as a team, and this I think was very clear from all the reviews we’ve been doing, we can’t give up.

“Race one will be what it is,” he added.

“Maybe it would be very good, maybe we’ll be a bit disappointed. Yeah, okay, turn the page, they’re still 22 races.

“I’ve no doubt that these guys [drivers Valtteri Bottas and Zhou Guanyu], but also the team at home, the 500 people, will be pushing very hard to then recover what needs to be recovered – if it is – or build an advantage if we would be at the higher end of the midfield.”