During the race weekend in Miami, drivers have been able to get their first taste of the changes to the technical regulations.
The tweaks to energy management are intended to address the, at times, dangerous closing speeds and make qualifying more on the limit, but the FIA and Formula 1 immediately made it clear that it will not fundamentally change the racing.
The latter is also the first impression of drivers after the sprint race in Miami. Reigning world champion Lando Norris describes it as a first step in the right direction, but adds that from a driver’s perspective more is still required.
“Some things remain as expected. There's still certain points where the quicker you go, the more penalised you get. And still in the future that's something we want to fix as drivers, and I think as Formula 1 as well,” the McLaren driver said after winning the sprint.
“You just want to be going flat out everywhere and maximising things. You don't want to go quicker somewhere on a qualifying lap and get penalised for it. That's just not how it should be, but it seems in the correct direction, and I think we're more likely to see a bigger benefit of it on other tracks.”
The latter is because the Miami International Autodrome is not the most critical track in terms of energy management, meaning that the pain points are not exposed to the same extent as in Australia.
“I think the thing is as drivers you're always going to see us complain a bit, because that's what we always do. But at the same time I think it's a step forward,” Norris continued.
“For the majority of the laps yesterday in qualifying you could push and you're not really thinking, I need to lift here earlier or I need to not get on throttle as much. It felt a little bit more normal and I think that was a nice thing.”
This indicates that the changes for qualifying – including lowering the harvesting limit – have had an effect, although Norris adds that the racing itself has not changed.
According to him, fundamentally improving the product remains something for the longer term.
“In the sprint race nothing really changes at all, apart from the super clips and things like that. But otherwise a step in the right direction is as much as we can really ask for at the minute. The rest of it has to come maybe later in the year, but also into the future years.”
That is confirmed by Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc. The Monegasque also acknowledges that there is still work to be done, but adds that drivers should not expect too much either.
“It's also true we need to have realistic expectations because we cannot change so much either. I think some of those technical regulations and the issues we are facing will remain there somehow,” he said.
“We can minimise them and I think the approach was right, and the steps the FIA has taken for here made it better. Whether we'll arrive at a situation where there won't be any of those problems anymore, I'm not sure.”
Is yo-yo racing here to stay?
During the sprint race in Miami, there appeared to be slightly fewer position changes purely due to energy management, in other words the much-discussed yo-yo racing.
According to the drivers, however, that has more to do with the nature of the track than the refinements.
“I think today also the fact that it was so warm being behind [another car] you overheat the tyres quite quickly,” Leclerc explained.
“That made it very difficult for me to be closer compared to the first three races, so it's probably a bit more dependent on [the conditions] today.”
Norris also believes that yo-yo racing is still a factor, but that multiple elements have masked it in Miami: “I think you'll still have it. There's no reason why it shouldn't be there. I think it's probably just like Charles says that the following is difficult here because of the temperatures. And it's a sprint race, so you're probably pushing a bit more flat out. I think once it starts you'll still have it, so we will see it tomorrow I guess.”
