What at first seemed to be just an uncomfortable consequence of F1’s switch to ground effect cars when it materialised in testing has turned into a critical area of performance.
Teams have quickly come to realise that the lower they can run their cars without being affected by porpoising, the more downforce they can gain.
And it is finding that sweet spot, between going for performance by running low but not suffering from too bad porpoising, that will be especially critical for teams in their set-up choices for this weekend.
Some outfits have found that right balance and have understood what needs to be done, whereas others like Mercedes are struggling a bit more to get on top of it.
Alpine, for example, was pretty chuffed at the end of last week’s test about how it had explored the set-up boundaries of its car to know what does and doesn’t work.
Sporting director Alan Permane said: “We can switch that on and off now. We know what makes that happen, what stops it.
“But…
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