{"id":31656,"date":"2025-03-19T11:05:37","date_gmt":"2025-03-19T15:05:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/?p=31656"},"modified":"2025-03-19T11:26:43","modified_gmt":"2025-03-19T15:26:43","slug":"f1-news-teams-brace-for-impact-ahead-of-new-fia-regulations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2025\/03\/19\/f1-news-teams-brace-for-impact-ahead-of-new-fia-regulations\/","title":{"rendered":"F1 News: Teams brace for impact ahead of new FIA regulations"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The first round of 2025 was extremely unpredictable, with wet conditions <strong>throwing a spanner in the works immediately<\/strong>. Even before the rain, several midfield drivers (<a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2025\/03\/17\/tsunoda-should-be-in-red-bull-instead-of-lawson-says-zak-brown\/\" target=\"_self\">Tsunoda<\/a>, Albon, Gasly, <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2025\/03\/16\/carlos-sainz-became-alex-albons-strategist-in-australia-vowles\/\" target=\"_self\">Sainz<\/a>) upset the front-runners in qualifying.<\/p>\n<p>On race day, whilst rain made it difficult to directly compare performance, the likes of Williams and VCARB showed solid pace.<\/p>\n<p>This increases the pressure on the top teams ahead of this weekend&#8217;s Chinese GP &#8211; <strong>when a new technical directive could impact performance<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<h4>Why the FIA&#8217;s latest directive matters<\/h4>\n<p>As mentioned previously on LWOS, <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2025\/03\/17\/fia-announce-new-technical-directive-which-teams-will-benefit\/\" target=\"_self\">the FIA is implementing new measures to control the &#8216;Mini-DRS&#8217; phenomenon<\/a> that is becoming increasingly prevalent across the field.<\/p>\n<p><strong>McLaren were the first to push the regulatory limits<\/strong>\u00a0with their rear wings at Baku last year.<\/p>\n<p>During the winter, the FIA determined it was necessary to impose harsher tests and regulations.<\/p>\n<p>This was in response to fears that teams had found ways to pass the FIA&#8217;s static tests (which measures wing flexing) <strong>whilst still benefiting from the aeroplasticity of flexi-wings on track<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Although a new technical directive was due to be applied at the Spanish GP (round 9), the FIA were proactive.<\/p>\n<p>F1&#8217;s sporting body <strong>introduced new cameras to monitor rear wing movement<\/strong> last weekend in Australia.<\/p>\n<p>Their response was swift and emphatic, introducing new measures for teams to adhere to at the Chinese GP.<\/p>\n<p><a id=\"WAd2o9VsR9BTXH8ScCUo3w\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/2205330893\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'WAd2o9VsR9BTXH8ScCUo3w',sig:'svJ45dHCILwyPjK2AsXkzq1iRG0ukH0B30r0Pa8i32E=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'2205330893',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Further restrictions and tests will be imposed at round three in Japan. The aim is to completely eliminate this grey area for the remainder of 2025.<\/p>\n<p>For the FIA to immediately implement a new technical directive indicates that <strong>several teams were benefiting from a flexible rear wing<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Although the performance gain from this component is unclear, the impact of revising their wings to be compliant with the regulations should cost certain teams a few tenths per lap.<\/p>\n<p>The question, inevitably, is who will be most impacted.<\/p>\n<h4>McLaren and Ferrari under the spotlight in Shanghai<\/h4>\n<p>Previously on LWOS, we analysed the potential winners and losers from the FIA&#8217;s latest clampdown.<\/p>\n<p>Over the winter break, the FIA&#8217;s first steps to restrict flexi front-wings (separate though not unrelated to the changes for this weekend) <strong>generated different reactions across the grid<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2025\/03\/16\/mclaren-reveal-norris-suffered-floor-damage-at-australian-gp\/\" target=\"_self\">McLaren<\/a>, understood to have started pushing this area before anyone else, were relatively unbothered by the latest announcement over winter.<\/p>\n<p>The same can be said for <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2025\/03\/16\/ferrari-have-no-answers-to-unbelievable-mclaren-pace\/\" target=\"_self\">Ferrari,<\/a> who downplayed the impact of the incoming directive.<\/p>\n<p>However, at pre-season testing, it was Red Bull who suggested that Ferrari and McLaren were still benefiting from &#8216;Mini-DRS&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p><a id=\"p9pWZZd-Tz11hihS_3jJpg\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/2205013114\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'p9pWZZd-Tz11hihS_3jJpg',sig:'SKDXAdXjabcCQKU1X2H5HppLf6y7rnslfbKGRV5clIk=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'2205013114',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n<p>This was the suspicion of Red Bull&#8217;s technical director &#8211; Pierre Wache. It was the Frenchman&#8217;s comments that reignited concerns about flexible wings in pre-season.<\/p>\n<p>According to a report from <a href=\"https:\/\/it.motorsport.com\/f1\/news\/f1-le-ali-flessibili-valgono-02-con-le-nuove-regole-chi-ci-rimettera-\/10704819\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">it.motorsport<\/a>, there are four main teams suspected to have benefited from flexi-wings in Australia:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ferrari, McLaren, Alpine and Haas<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>At this stage, reaching conclusions about which teams were pushing the limits of the regulations is difficult.<\/p>\n<p>Only the FIA and teams themselves will have concrete data on this issue.<\/p>\n<p>Still, considering that adjustments to become compliant with the regulations have been ordered immediately, <strong>anyone who was gaining an advantage in this area will be caught out<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Even if they only lose a few tenths per lap, it could tip the scales in an increasingly competitive field.<\/p>\n<p>Considering that teams are already switching their focus to the 2026 regulations, any difficulties at the early stages of this year could complicate resource allocation further down the line.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The first round of 2025 was extremely unpredictable, with wet conditions throwing a spanner in the works immediately. Even before the rain, several midfield drivers (Tsunoda, Albon, Gasly, Sainz) upset the front-runners in qualifying. On race day, whilst rain made it difficult to directly compare performance, the likes of Williams and VCARB showed solid pace. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4927,"featured_media":31657,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,3],"tags":[2452,637],"class_list":["post-31656","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-formula-1","category-news","tag-f1-2025-season","tag-fia"],"modified_by":"Jaden Diaz-Ndisang","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31656","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4927"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31656"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31656\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31666,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31656\/revisions\/31666"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31657"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}