Ferrari's Spain upgrade helped ease their 'Achilles' heel'

Ferrari's Spanish Grand Prix Formula 1 upgrade helped to ease the "Achilles' heel" that had been plaguing the SF-23, according to Jock Clear.

The Scuderia introduced a big upgrade package in Barcelona, with a sidepod concept similar in nature to the Red Bull as the 'bathtub' style pioneered since the start of the ground effects era was dropped.

While explaining that the sidepods and their shape were not actually that important, Clear explained how a weakness of the car had been strengthened.

Ferrari's Achilles heel

While the SF-23 is a strong package in slow-speed corners, it struggles through high-speed sections and is a peaky machine.

It means Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz have not been able to extract the maximum potential from the car as much as they would like, with the car generally strong over one lap in qualifying but often suffering from tyre degradation during a race.

Clear has explained how the change to the sidepods has helped to make the car "more benign" to drive.

"What you see most visually on the sidepod probably is not a primary driver," Clear told media, including RacingNews365.com, when asked about airflow to the rear of the car.

"That is a secondary part, what you're doing with the floor and the diffuser is what dictates really where the downforce is coming from.

"That leads you to pushing air in different places above the floor, so you're not going to look at it and say: 'We need to go for these different sidepods', you're going to look at what's happening on the floor around the rear wheel and you're going to say: 'Okay we need to change the regime there'.

"As a result of that regime change, you're going to end up with a different sidepod.

"Our Achilles' heel has been a very peaky car, and I think it's a bit more fulsome than in the past where we've just looked at making the car a bit more benign.

"This is an upgrade that's brought performance, not just in terms of grunt, it's brought some more air out to the back end of the car.

"But in doing so, it's also made the car a little bit less sensitive to wind, yaw and altitude changes."