2025 Scuderia Ferrari F1 Team

[ScuderiaLeo]

From Duchessa and AR... note that this can be considered "preliminary info" since it's published right after the weekend and there hasn't been much time to examine things. They'll probably update it if they learn more specifics over the break.

Ferrari’s approach was to trap the McLarens in dirty air, and early on the plan looked flawless. Leclerc launched cleanly from pole and avoided any wheel-to-wheel battles. Russell even got ahead of Norris, which should have eased Ferrari’s defence, but in reality it opened the door for McLaren to split strategies.

The big question: what happened to Leclerc’s race? With all teams pushing the Venturi cars to the edge on ride heights and pressures, lap 48 marked the turning point. From then on, Leclerc couldn’t better his 1:20.440, while rivals on fresh tyres were a full second quicker. Within 20 laps, Ferrari lost 30 seconds to Piastri, ending any hope of a win.

Ferrari cited an unspecified chassis fault that made the SF-25 increasingly unmanageable. Mid-corner understeer ruined traction and cost Leclerc around 8 km/h on the straights. Tyre pressure strategy may have been a factor, as adjustments to regain lost stiffness backfired. Altering the front wing and pressures is routine, but in this case the car fell completely out of its working window.

Once outside that window, the Ferrari slid everywhere and recovery was impossible. Red Bull had faced similar issues with Verstappen on Friday. Suggestions that Ferrari planned to be strong in the first stint but not the second are baseless. The drop in performance was not intentional.

Technical Director Serra was on-site in Budapest, where the new suspension showed promise in braking and traction. Still, the setup needs more refinement. Ferrari will revisit the simulator in Maranello to address any Budapest missteps.

The car’s inherent limitations, particularly in the mechanical platform’s travel range, remain — after all, the front suspension cannot be altered. The hope is that, after further mileage, the updated SF-25 will be in its prime from the Netherlands onwards. This is especially important with Monza coming up.

[TimW]

Dr.obbs' take on this

thank you for the link.

Just to summarize the conclusion of the tweet (and not to toot my own horn here, but I also wrote this earlier):

So in summary, aero loads with these high downforce coefficient race cars are in fact a major contributing element to the load on the suspensions. And heavy fuel vs. low fuel loads may not be the primary contributing factor. And as fuel burns off the increase in speed now means that the planks actually contact the ground more. Obviously this is track dependent, so plenty of nuances to this as well.

So from lap 57 onwards in the race, LEC at the lowest fuel of the race was reaching the highest speeds in the race at the end of the straight, supposedly to avert plank wear?

Mah...

If they increased tire pressures to avoid plank wear it all makes perfect sense. Top speed is not affected, but cornering speed is.

[Sergej]

From Duchessa and AR... note that this can be considered "preliminary info" since it's published right after the weekend and there hasn't been much time to examine things. They'll probably update it if they learn more specifics over the break.

Ferrari’s approach was to trap the McLarens in dirty air, and early on the plan looked flawless. Leclerc launched cleanly from pole and avoided any wheel-to-wheel battles. Russell even got ahead of Norris, which should have eased Ferrari’s defence, but in reality it opened the door for McLaren to split strategies.

The big question: what happened to Leclerc’s race? With all teams pushing the Venturi cars to the edge on ride heights and pressures, lap 48 marked the turning point. From then on, Leclerc couldn’t better his 1:20.440, while rivals on fresh tyres were a full second quicker. Within 20 laps, Ferrari lost 30 seconds to Piastri, ending any hope of a win.

Ferrari cited an unspecified chassis fault that made the SF-25 increasingly unmanageable. Mid-corner understeer ruined traction and cost Leclerc around 8 km/h on the straights. Tyre pressure strategy may have been a factor, as adjustments to regain lost stiffness backfired. Altering the front wing and pressures is routine, but in this case the car fell completely out of its working window.

Once outside that window, the Ferrari slid everywhere and recovery was impossible. Red Bull had faced similar issues with Verstappen on Friday. Suggestions that Ferrari planned to be strong in the first stint but not the second are baseless. The drop in performance was not intentional.

Technical Director Serra was on-site in Budapest, where the new suspension showed promise in braking and traction. Still, the setup needs more refinement. Ferrari will revisit the simulator in Maranello to address any Budapest missteps.

The car’s inherent limitations, particularly in the mechanical platform’s travel range, remain — after all, the front suspension cannot be altered. The hope is that, after further mileage, the updated SF-25 will be in its prime from the Netherlands onwards. This is especially important with Monza coming up.

bwoah, classic PR management from AR here...."setup still to be refined", "potential to be extracted"....maybe in Abu Dhabi they will be able to extract this mythological potential

also, I don't get the last sentence "after all, the front suspension cannot be altered." front suspension ? they always said that the change in the front suspension has been flawless, why is it becoming a factor now ?

[FDD]

Dr.obbs' take on this

thank you for the link.

Just to summarize the conclusion of the tweet (and not to toot my own horn here, but I also wrote this earlier):

So in summary, aero loads with these high downforce coefficient race cars are in fact a major contributing element to the load on the suspensions. And heavy fuel vs. low fuel loads may not be the primary contributing factor. And as fuel burns off the increase in speed now means that the planks actually contact the ground more. Obviously this is track dependent, so plenty of nuances to this as well.

So from lap 57 onwards in the race, LEC at the lowest fuel of the race was reaching the highest speeds in the race at the end of the straight, supposedly to avert plank wear?

Mah...

If they increased tire pressures to avoid plank wear it all makes perfect sense. Top speed is not affected, but cornering speed is.

Keep in mind that cornering speed in turn 11 (the fastest turn) in the last stint, was higher for LEC compared to himself from the first stint. Also in the last stint top cornering speed in turn 11 was very simmilar compared to OSC.
In high speed corners with higher speed achivning the car shall go even lower which means more plank wear.
LEC was dramatically loosing time in low speed corners.
This is not possible (better top speed in high speed corners) for car which has to manage excessive plank wearing, not at all.