Forget last year, no refuelling is the biggest change in years

By the end of the 2009 season Ferrari had written off development on their F2009 car, abandoning what had been a disastrous year for them in order to focus on 2010. It’s not a new gamble – it paid off for Brawn (nee Honda) last season, and completely failed to pay off for BMW when they attempted the same thing. But their decision was motivated by the sweeping rule changes that came into force in 2009, totally changing the shape and balance of the car.

By contrast, the regulations for 2010 are largely the same as last year – leading many, including other F1 teams like McLaren, to conclude that the best strategy for 2010 is to continue developing their 2009 car, on the assumption that next year’s machinery will be a natural evolution of the cars they have produced this season.

However, what Ferrari have anticipated is that the banning of refuelling is going to fundamentally alter the behaviour of the cars next year, to a greater extent than any aerodynamic modifications of recent years have managed.

One of the most important factors in the performance of an F1 car is how it is balanced; it is important for a car to be stable or it will be impossible to drive. Starting on a full tank of fuel, F1 cars will start the race weighing around 780kg, which will drain to 620kg by the end of a Grand Prix. This massive difference in weight means that the fuel tanks must form the car’s centre of gravity, to stop the balance of the car shifting uncontrollably as the race progresses.

It was rumoured at the start of the season that one of the fundamental problems with the F2009 was its centre of gravity was somewhat off-centre; this problem will be exacerbated in 2010, and probably explains why Ferrari felt that this year’s car was no basis for next season’s challenger.

This year the FIA gave us the luxury of releasing the declared weight of each car before the start of the race, enabling fans to calculate fuel strategies before the race began. Over the course of the season, very few cars ever topped 700kg; what that means is that the ban on refuelling is a massive step into the unknown for teams, in terms of how their cars will behave.

Generally the behaviour of heavier cars is predictable; longer braking distances, slower acceleration and so on. But how the aerodynamics will work given the effects of an extra 100kg or so is less clear, and a lot of development time will be devoted to determining the best aerodynamic solution for each car. Perhaps even more critical is balancing the performance of the car, so it is consistently quick throughout the race. Again, this will be a challenge to F1’s finest technical minds, to best figure out how to surmount these difficulties.

Thus McLaren’s approach – to throw their resources into continued development of their 2009 car in the hope that some of it will be transferable to 2010 – seems like a gross underestimation of the changes conveyed by the ban on refuelling. However, the men who come and go across Woking’s immaculately polished gravel are not stupid, and they will have their own solutions to the problems posed by the new rule.

2010, then, should be expected to be every bit as much of a lottery as 2009 was, where the established order was overturned by some clever thinking from a couple of the smaller teams. Perhaps it is time once again for the best minds, rather than the fattest wallets, to shine.

F1’s head honchos – and by that I mean the people who are more concerned with “the show” than the technical spectacle that is F1 – are currently panicking over the perceived lack of excitement that will be generated by a lack of refuelling. But whatever happens on the track, from a technological point of view it’s going to be fascinating.