2026 Scuderia Ferrari HP F1 Team

[venkyhere]

I only watched races and some quali highlights last year because Ferrari were so bad. How do you think McLaren & Verstappen produce a sandbagged laptime with max settings?

by pushing in selective mini-sectors and ease off in other mini-sectors , and then do the inverse in the next lap, and show 'consistent laptime'. It will be seen as the car having to suffer from 'tradeoff' between corner entry and exits. So sandbagging can be done by the driver, it doesn't need the car to be compromised from whatever is the 'target performance after risk evaluation' that the team wants.
Piastri (first half), Russel & Max did it so well last season, even all the way until end of Q1 - not revealing their trump cards driving wise, and build a perception of 'car limitation'.

To what end?

easy.
So that other people fighting for pole don't practice 'successful risks' and find more laptime.

[f1isgood]

Hmm, I am not sure whether there was real sandbagging at any point anyways. It was pretty clear if Max/RB were going to be in the hunt or not from the get go in most weekends. McLaren always looked good in FP.

[jambuka]

So seems like Mercedes hp gain from compression is done deal now ? Seems Ferrari is going to implement it in 2027 PU

[dans79]

easy.
So that other people fighting for pole don't practice 'successful risks' and find more laptime.

I'm sorry to say all the teams are smarter than that. They can all see each others gps data, and they can use that to predict each others performance fairly accurately. This is exactly how MB and RB pushed the FIA into investigating Ferrari's PU in 2019.

One of the few things teams can't determine is how good or bad a competitor is on their tires.

[Waz]

So seems like Mercedes hp gain from compression is done deal now ? Seems Ferrari is going to implement it in 2027 PU

It’s not the advantage some think. Obviously everything adds up, but it's not a game changer.

[dans79]

So seems like Mercedes hp gain from compression is done deal now ? Seems Ferrari is going to implement it in 2027 PU

It’s not the advantage some think. Obviously everything adds up, but it's not a game changer.

Exactly!

It Irritates the He** out of me how the press will make absurd claims, and far to many people just believe them now days.

[bluechris]

So seems like Mercedes hp gain from compression is done deal now ? Seems Ferrari is going to implement it in 2027 PU

It’s not the advantage some think. Obviously everything adds up, but it's not a game changer.

How do you know?

[deadhead]

So seems like Mercedes hp gain from compression is done deal now ? Seems Ferrari is going to implement it in 2027 PU

It’s not the advantage some think. Obviously everything adds up, but it's not a game changer.

How do you know?

Even the teams don’t know exactly

[dans79]

It’s not the advantage some think. Obviously everything adds up, but it's not a game changer.

How do you know?

Even the teams don’t know exactly

They might not know exactly, but they know there's only so many ways you can do it and stay within the bounds of the rules, and not cause yourself some other issue.

I bet in the grand scheme of things it's probably not even worth 5hp.

[f1316]

by pushing in selective mini-sectors and ease off in other mini-sectors , and then do the inverse in the next lap, and show 'consistent laptime'. It will be seen as the car having to suffer from 'tradeoff' between corner entry and exits. So sandbagging can be done by the driver, it doesn't need the car to be compromised from whatever is the 'target performance after risk evaluation' that the team wants.
Piastri (first half), Russel & Max did it so well last season, even all the way until end of Q1 - not revealing their trump cards driving wise, and build a perception of 'car limitation'.

To what end?

easy.
So that other people fighting for pole don't practice 'successful risks' and find more laptime.

I don’t follow what “successful risks” means but I think it’s a total fallacy that any team is not striving to find as much lap time as they can at all times. No one is sitting there saying “oh, looks like the others aren’t fast, so we won’t bother trying to find the last bit of lap time”. That’s not the way F1 works.

I don’t believe for a second that anyone does this kind of micro sector sandbagging nor do I believe that any of the teams don’t know exactly where they stand. It’s not as if teams make a slower car because they’re lulled into a false sense of security - again, that’s a fallacy.

What teams do is avoid using high engine or deployment modes unless needed. That means not over stressing them in practice and sometimes only running them when higher on fuel during pre season.

[SpecialOps]

So seems like Mercedes hp gain from compression is done deal now ? Seems Ferrari is going to implement it in 2027 PU

It’s not the advantage some think. Obviously everything adds up, but it's not a game changer.

If it’s not such an advantage then why is there a threat of a protest and all these technical discussions? Higher compression leads to better power output and fuel efficiency. That means less weight required to start the race which is faster lap time etc.

[johnnycesup]

easy.
So that other people fighting for pole don't practice 'successful risks' and find more laptime.

Even if this was true (I doubt it) wouldn't everyone catch on after the first time and just assume that their opponents are sandbagging? I mean, "Fool me once, shame on—shame on you. Fool me—you can't get fooled again"

[ryaan2904]

How do you know?

Even the teams don’t know exactly

I bet in the grand scheme of things it's probably not even worth 5hp.

Actually any compression ratio tricks can deliver big gains. You produce more power, the engine is more efficient so you need less fuel (weight savings) and you might also need less cooling. The benefits compound

[ryaan2904]

I am surprised Ferrari never thought of this. Maybe they were conservative due to the whole 2019 fiasco. Nonetheless, im always left chagrined by how mercedes has bullet proof lobbying and can get away with anything in the sport. In 2014 they did the illegal tyre tests. 2017/18 they were the first to burn oil and benefitted from it, then when Ferrari did it they complained (after already having reaped the benefits). 2021 they had DAS which was a questionable interpretation of the rules. Fia banned it but allowed them to use it for that year cuz it was "innovative". Well Ferrari 2019 engine was innovative too, so innovative that Fia couldn't prove any allegations after keeping the car/engine impounded for months. Ofc, Ferrari couldn't keep their advantage even 1 season.

Then when mercs actually made a --- car, fia bent over backwards to bring TD39 "for safety reasons". I didn't see any reduction in porpoising after that random bs directive. Like after years of watching the sport, you can't help but notice these unsymmetric ways in which the fia dishes out "directives" in the name of "fair racing".

[dans79]

Actually any compression ratio tricks can deliver big gains. You produce more power, the engine is more efficient so you need less fuel (weight savings) and you might also need less cooling. The benefits compound

Only in the hypothetical world.

The teams are very limited when it comes to the materials they can use on ICE components. For example for connecting rods they can use titanium of steel. Steel has a higher coefficient of thermal expansion, but it's also substantially heavier. Teams have used titanium connecting rods for a long time because they can be made ~20% to 25% lighter than a steal equivalent rod.

Just to be clear you want the connecting rods to be as light as possible, because heavier rods increases reciprocating mass. That hinders acceleration at all times, puts additional stress on the crankshaft, and increase wear.

Multiple Restrictions and tradeoffs exist for every single part of the ICE, that's why its show shocking that people believe what the press is pulling out of their back side. If it was so easy the the f1 press could figure it all out, the teams would all be doing it already.