13/01/2022
NEWS STORY
Other than whether Lewis Hamilton chooses to continue racing, the other thing that has sphincters twitching at F1 Towers is the effectiveness of the 2022 rules overhaul. In terms of the latter, Nico Hulkenberg has his doubts.
The German, who began his F1 career with Williams in 2010 and subsequently spent time with Force India, Sauber, Renault and Racing Point, believes the new generation of F1 car will be "pretty damn fast" but that dirty air will continue make close pursuit of a rival difficult.
From the moment it bought F1 in early 2017, Liberty Media had made clear its desire to improve the quality of the racing by means of levelling the playing field. Along with a budget cap which, in essence, limits all the teams in terms of spending, central to the Liberty masterplan was an overhaul of the aero rules, with Ross Brawn at the helm as the sport sought to reduce the impact of the wings and instead look to the ground effect of the cars' undersides as the main source of downforce.
While Hulkenberg is confident that the cars will be fast, he expresses doubt over whether the regulation changes will have the desired impact.
"They aimed to be a bit slower, more challenging to drive, to have more focus on drivers that can make a difference rather car performance and aerodynamics dominate," writs the German on his LinkedIn page.
"From my initial experience however, the new cars are pretty damn fast and not necessarily slower than the last generation," he continues.
"The driving experience hasn't changed that much either, at least in the simulator," he adds. "It will be very interesting to see whether these cars can really follow the car in front better.
"In the simulator, the cornering speeds are extremely high," he reveals, "so the risk of 'dirty air' is still given and it's difficult for me to imagine that following another car comfortably at these speeds will be easy.
"Anyhow, I hope we will positively surprised. Once pre-season testing starts drivers and teams will find out how the cars really behave on track.
"It's too early for predictions," he admits, "although I would be very surprised if the top teams from previous years will not be near the front.
"By the way, these larger tyres make no difference to the drivers' visibility," he adds, referring to the new for 2022 18-inch tyres. "The driver will just see more rim instead of tyre wall like in the past."