The FIA implemented its directive on porpoising this weekend at Spa-Francorchamps, with sensors that measure the vertical oscillations experienced by the drivers.
Limits not to be exceeded must therefore be respected by each team for its two single-seaters, so that the rebounds are not too violent. This technical directive was strongly criticised, notably by Ferrari and Red Bull, who believed that the violent porpoising of the start of the season was now a thing of the past.
But the FIA, supported by Mercedes F1 and research from the medical side, had to control this, before the arrival of floors raised by 15 mm in 2023, which should eradicate this aerodynamic phenomenon to a large extent.
Nikolas Tombazis, head of single-seaters at the FIA, fully assumes the implementation of these measures at Spa and for 2023.
« There are short-term effects, situations like the ones we had in Baku, which cannot be repeated, but there are also long-term effects. We have seen quite a few sports which have ignored the alarm bells and who have paid dearly for the health of their athletes. »
« We didn’t want to be in such a situation. Our concern was great and we discussed it with medical experts. »
“Of course not everyone agreed, it would have been a surprise if they hadn’t objected. F1 is extremely competitive by nature, anything adopted as regulations is always naturally first judged by this question: ‘Does this benefit us more than it benefits our rivals?’ But we couldn’t not do something because someone would have criticized us in the end. »
