“I will be surprised if we are the only ones,” Aston Martin believe their rear wing idea will be stolen by other teams
Aston Martin team principal Mike Krack
The Hungarian Grand Prix saw Aston Martin introduce a major upgrade to their rear wing, which was in speculation around the paddock due to the change in performance of the AMR22. The team has been underperforming (compared to last year) since the start of this season, and one of the major reasons is the newly introduced regulations which have brought in a significant change in the aerodynamics of the cars. Although it was supposed to be and has been innovative, many of the teams on the grid have failed to adapt to the same.
The changes in the aerodynamics of the cars this year made them chase each other much closer, but at the same time the effect of the DRS system was reduced drastically, and so was the downforce that the rear wing produced. However, the new rear wing, which the team revealed took “months” to be approved by the FIA, was producing significantly high downforce, similar to the 2021 cars, and was criticized by other teams.
But because the FIA declared it legal, it became a great innovation for high downforce-demanding circuits, and so, the team principal is quite sure that other teams would soon steal the idea.
Aston Martin believe their wing would work best at tracks that require high downforce
The reason why the team believes that their rear wing would be copied later into the season by other teams is because of the massive downforce it creates. Tracks like Singapore and Netherlands are narrow and carry a great risk of cars losing their rear and going off track or hitting a wall. This is the reason they would require a lot of downforce, which would be hard for the teams to create unless they use a modified wing like Aston did at Hungary.
“The next high downforce races are Netherlands and Singapore. I will be surprised if we are the only ones in Singapore racing with this idea,” Mike Krack stated, as F1All quotes.
This is not the first time this season that the team had to run around the FIA, earlier, they were accused of copying Red Bull’s sidepod upgrades, but again, it was all declared legal by the sport’s authorities. While copying & modifying other teams’ innovative ideas is not new in Formula 1, it can sometimes get teams into trouble, and it has happened throughout the history of the sport, that an innovation gets banned, and this is perhaps what Aston Martin would fear at this moment.
Also read: FIA technical director Nikolas Tombazis takes a deep dive into Formula 1’s 2022 changes and future
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Gunaditya Tripathi
(274 Articles Published)