Photo: Scuderia Ferrari
Without a shadow of a doubt, one of the most discussed topics during last season was the one relating to the introduction, at the Belgian GP, of the TD39. The rule introduced by the FIA with the aim of finding a solution to the phenomenon of porpoising, the aerodynamic hopping on a straight line that has caused many problems for teams and drivers.
A directive which, as mentioned, had been introduced at Spa Francorchamps which brought with it the famous AOM metric with which FIA controlled the oscillations of the cars. All with the aim of containing porpoising after the complaints of the teams which, appealing to safety, contested the jumping that had been seen in some of the first races of the season, such as Melbourne or Baku, on almost all the cars and, in particular, on the Mercedes.
Mercedes which, everyone will remember, had been one of the main supporters (with strong pressure on the International Federation) of the introduction of this standard. But in addition to the TD39 which, in the forecasts was to have immediate effects in 2022, the FIA introduced addictional rules with a view to 2023 to eradicate porpoising, not relying much on this directive, but modifying the technical regulation: from Place de la Concorde they had imposed single-seater (from this year), to control the phenomenon, the lifting of the pavement of the bottom of 15 mm and of the elbow of the diffuser of 10 mm.
New rules which, as reported today by the website ‘Motorsport.com’, have led the FIA to repeal the famous, and all too much discussed, technical directive 39, which has now become superfluous.
“Motorsport.com has learned that the algorithm was canceled at the beginning of the championship, after it had already been loosened at the Singapore GP to prevent some single-seaters from going beyond the norm due to the roughness of the city road surface”.
An abolition which, objectively, has far from secondary importance, both for the influences on field values during 2022, and for the ways in which this repeal took place. In fact, the FIA did not issue any kind of official statement.
“Nobody mentioned it. Indeed, the change was written in a technical correction that the FIA issued to the teams. […] Because, in spite of the transparency heralded by F1, the “rule” was repealed in absolute silence”.
