In another week, the new season of F1 will officially kick off, before which the teams need to carry out three more days of official testing at the opening bahrain circuit, and the liveliness of these three days can be said to ignite the atmosphere to another commanding height.
From Barcelona to Bahrain, although only two weeks have passed, but the F1 paddock can be said to be a little bit of no stop, not exaggerated description, the next season of "Fast Survival" may have collected at least one episode of the program material during this time.
It seems that during the barcelona winter test, the Mercedes-AMG team seemed a bit dull, in fact, the W13A version of the car was made by the team in early January, mercedes almost faced the embarrassment of empty garages in Barcelona, but two weeks later in Bahrain, they came up with a secret weapon.
It can be said that in addition to Mercedes-Benz itself, no one would have thought that the B version of the W13 car would be so extreme, in a word to describe the opening is no side box design, the original cooling port has become two very narrow vertical slots, and the side panels have also become unconventional to become narrow and wide.
How will such a design pass rigorous crash tests? The solution brought by Mercedes was to add two aircraft-like elements on both sides of the pilot, which is also the bracket of the rearview mirror, and the two wings used to solve the collision are not new elements, and the FE racing car in the early years is such a structure.
The W13B caused an uproar, and the most direct competitor, Red Bull Racing team leader Horner, will definitely stand up and accuse Mercedes-Benz of design at this time, it seems that Mercedes has already anticipated this, so the CAD data on W13B was sent to the relevant officials of the FIA a few weeks ago.
But judging from the results of the three days of testing in Bahrain, the W13B did not bring too amazing performance, it is certain that the car is relatively fast in the slow corner, but once the car is pushed to the limit, the problem of dolphin jumping will become very obvious, mercedes' car in the straight line is not fast, in other words, their car only has a side box is very creative, the rest of the parts are not too bright at present.
Is the scene of fast corners and slow straights somewhat familiar? Is Mercedes hiding something? No one knows, last year's performance in the Bahrain test seems to be unsatisfactory, but the results of the Bahrain opener are also there for all to see, Ferrari driver Sainz also said: "Mercedes is always to the main race to sweep everything", but from Bahrain's point of view, maybe the first few rounds of this year, Mercedes-Benz may not take advantage of anything.
And foreign media now generally believe that Ferrari's car is in better shape, and it is good in all aspects, or it can be described as balanced - at least it is very easy to drive - other teams are trying to get the car on the right track, while Ferrari is already on the track.
That's why when Red Bull brushed the fastest lap of the game on the third day, Marco was happy to say that at least they were now on an equal footing with Ferrari, and Red Bull pulled out a new side box on the last day, except that their car was still slow in the slow corner, after all, it was a bit heavy, but their control of the Dolphin jump was not bad, and after upgrading the kit, some of the problems of understeering were solved.
So less than a week later, at least who will take pole position in Bahrain, the answer is still confusing, Barcelona's favored McLaren also has brake problems, the first year of the implementation of the new rules, indeed everything is unknown.
Zhou Guanyu's personal performance is generally good, 11th overall lap time, but the Arrival of the Alfa Romeo team in Bahrain still does not seem to have solved the reliability problem, which also makes the team's test total mileage ranking almost at the bottom, but there are also positive aspects, maybe this year they have the opportunity to qualify in Q3, which is good news for Zhou Guanyu.
On the other hand, the weight of the car, Sauber is the only team in the paddock that does not approve of increasing the minimum weight by 3 kg,
Some big teams even want this value to be 5 kg, after all, in order to solve the Dolphin jump, they have to strengthen the bottom plate of the car and add support bars to the rear of the car – this is also the solution agreed by the FIA, but in the end everyone compromised and the weight gain figure was tentatively set at 3 kg.
In fact, the midstream teams have made relatively good results in the winter test, which makes the new season more suspenseful, Mick Schumacher even brushed the second place on the last day, although the Haas team's total test mileage in Barcelona and Bahrain is at the bottom, they have encountered too many problems in the last two weeks, including the problems of the team sponsor and the Russian driver Ma Zeping.
In the end, Haas team chose to terminate the contract with Ma Zeping, replaced by the team's former driver Magnussen, it seems that we Race as One, the phrase "very good" in F1 has not been "shown", but even if Ma Zeping can participate, he may face the problem of not getting a European visa.
Looking at a driver's news, McLaren driver Caddo tested positive for COVID-19, missed the test in Bahrain, and missed the driver's big group photo, but at the moment his situation has improved, and theoretically there is not much problem in catching up with the opener. On Sunday 20 March, F1 will be the opening match of the 2022 season, and all questions may be answered, so stay tuned.
The author of this article is a kick car gang Lu Yu