Formula 1 designers and engineers will be expecting to be busy after the pre-season testing when rival teams will be putting their new 2021 F1 cars on the track while others will try to copy them.
However, regulations require that the 2021 F1 cars should be a modification of last year’s cars, but there are also new changes which include new floors and bargeboards as every team was given development tokens to upgrade their cars.
Mercedes, who unveiled their 2021 contender last week admitted they didn’t display all the upgrades on their new car as they wanted to keep them a secret.
“Of course we have hidden a new super trick there, otherwise we would have shown it. You will all be amazed when you see it. If we show everything now, we give the competition extra options,” Mercedes boss, Toto Wolff said.
“They can then look at things, evaluate them and maybe even calculate them with CFD models. This would allow them to come onto the track at the first, second or maybe third race with a similar update.”
But with the period between testing which will be on March 12 and the season opener which will kick off on March 26, teams may tend to copy one another.
“The secrecy that people are showing at the moment [is] the area around the side of the floor, in front of the tyre, the brake ducts, how people reacted to all that area,” Alpine technical director Pat Fry told RaceFans.net.
“I think it’s the things that people will be trying to keep their powder dry on.
“In reality, I could see something on someone’s car and if it’s a different fence in that area or a different shape of floor in that area, I could be testing that in the [wind] tunnel in two days and have it on the car in a week.
“So a large rule change has happened – OK, a very limited part of the car – but it would be quite easy to react and see if someone has got something that’s working better than everyone else.
“It’s just the nature of Formula 1, isn’t it? We all think we’re clever and we all try and hide what we’re doing and then you find out how quick you are come the Bahrain race.”
