2022 Regulations, Did it deliver on its promise?

[Zico]

Formula one is a highly technical sport where differences of milliseconds translate to millions of dollars for drivers and teams. Hence all aspects of it are observed from a purely scientific perspective. Hence, when there is an objective-inspired change in regulation, we should take a scientific view to access its effectiveness and measure its success in achieving its objective.

There has been open debate about this topic. For many, the racing is familiar because it is similar to what we are used to in the past; tough duelling in the midfield and one team beating the rest of the grid by 30 seconds or more and waltzing off to win the championship with ease. This 2023 season has started off with all the hallmarks of just that scenario. What can be perceived from the immediate outlook is that the 2022 regulation and its variant in 2023 is clearly highly effective in the midfield where the racing is more intense than at any time in F1 history; but, no discernable effect can be seen at the sharp end of the grid. The status quo remains, meaning a dominant team can still emerge to win titles with zero competition from the nearest rivals. The net result is the F1 competition is for all other positions bar the championship-winning positions.

While l am mindful that l am commenting too early in the season, the season opener always gives a good indication of how the season would turn out. It tells us who is dominant and the extent of the dominance and how close the nearest rival is to the dominant team. This gives us an indicative measure of the level of competition for the titles we should expect this season.

By jove, Redbull has turned up with a car that is even more dominant than the 2022 car. Verstappen finished the race 38.637 seconds ahead of Alonso in the Aston Martin and he wasn't even pushing to the limit. That car probably has a full minute gap of race pace to the Aston if pushed to the limit.

The question is, what are the criteria for stating that the 2022 regulation is effective in the sharp end of the grid?

I think the following should manifest:

1. All cars racing at the sharp end of the grid should be within 5 seconds from the leading car at all times during the race.
2. The race should finish with the top two or three cars within two seconds of each other. Think of Jedda 2022, Verstapenn versus Leclerc. Now that is racing.

Of course, this scenario may not manifest itself at all races due to many factors that may produce a maintainable gap for the leading car. But in the above scenario, these factors should not produce a regular occurrence that manifests a clear untouchable dominance of racing.

To be fair, this last point is what should be proven by the next four races at least to put this criticism at bay. We could say therefore that we should revisit this discussion in four race time, l think. Though, l am not holding my breath, l expect Redbull to be miles ahead in four races time.

The criteria is that the teams are closer together than before.. which they generally are.
Yes Red Bull are perhaps the exception to the above trend, IMO they just got it right last year, successfully evolved the car for this year and have probably just been far more efficient and successful in making the correct upgrade choices going forwards.
That said, I still feel that the fact that all the midfield teams are generally much closer together proves that the new regs are achieving what they set out to achieve.

Red Bull will be affected more than the others with reduced CFD/wind tunnel time later on in the season, yes it will probably be far too late to affect the championship outcome but unless they start putting literal success ballast on the cars on a race by race basis, (which I wouldn't feel comfortable with and also find very contrived) This is about as fair as it can be.

Red Bull will probably go on to dominate this season but by 2024 they are going to start being affected by their budget and CFD reduction success ballast. It will just take a bit of time to show that it works, I very much doubt Red Bull will continue to dominate for the next 5 years to the same degree that Merc previously did.

If you think the new regs are not working fast enough, what new rules would you suggest that is going to guarantee your (unrealistic IMO) results criteria on a regular basis?

Would you still be as concerned that no one was challenging Merc if THEY were still dominating?

I think the only way you could get your desired deltas on a regular basis would be if F1 became a single chassis/engine series to put everyone on the exact same performance baseline..