In the latest Talking Bull podcast, Adrian Newey — Chief Technical Officer — was interviewed.
During the podcast he talked about the newest changes in the regulations and the work around the 2023 car.
Newey was far from impressed at the regulations initially, but after some pressure from the teams to alter things, there was things his incredible brain could get stuck into.
“2021 was a huge regulation change. The biggest regulation since the flat bottom cars of 1983. From a chassis point of view as oppose to engine, it was absolutely massive.
“Initially, I must admit, I was a bit depressed by the regulations when I first saw them, but they were then relaxed a bit as a result of pressure from the teams, and the more you got into it the more you could see that, actually, there is more freedom than we thought.
“That resulted at the start of last year in a lot of cars looking quite different to each other which I think is always a good thing, always nice that viewers can tell the cars not by the livery but also by the shapes.”
The shapes were indeed quite different. Mercedes went with the zero sidepod car, but it hasn’t paid off.
Ahead of this weekend’s Monaco Grand Prix, it’s clear Mercedes’ updates are going to see them change path and head down a route more similar to the other teams.
Newey went into detail about the development race and sticking to their guns on a very successful concept.
“We took our concept. Ferrari had a slightly different but broadly similar concept [at the start of 2022]. Mercedes had a very different concept, the so called zero sidepod.
“When you start off on a road in the development of the car, you have to make a decision at some point about what route you’re going to take, and we obviously chose ours, the others chose theirs.
“You get then to the first season, you know, the first races, the season goes on, you develop your strategy, if you like. Mercedes developed theirs, Ferrari develop theirs. And you’re never sure which is going to have the ultimate potential. The early starter might not — if you like, have the longest branch or road or whatever adjective you want to use.”
Red Bull’s mastermind, Newey is known as one of the greatest engineers that F1 has ever seen and the creator of the design legacy around many winning cars through the decades.
He was also asked if he had a vision of what the 2023 car would have been like well in advance.
“You have a vision of what you’re trying to come up with, which is led by wind tunnel, cfd, mechanical design considerations, trying to get the package to work as a whole, vehicle dynamics obviously.
“You try to blend all those three disciplines together to produce what you hope will be the fastest package. Once you’re on that route, then you have to — unless it’s obviously got inherent problems, you tend to keep going.
“And so far, the basic concept seems to have been decent. And so what RB19, this year’s car, compared to last year’s really is a detailed evolution.
“We critique to the things we weren’t happy with, the car was still slightly overweight, there were a few handling things the we weren’t quite happy with, the usual kind of aerodynamic development, minor regulation changes, the floor edge height, so all those things you kind of throw into the mix.
“As you can see, this year’s car is clearly a strong family resemblance to last year’s, but improved in many detailed ways.”
Photo Credit: Red Bull Racing
