Toto Wolff, Guenther Steiner, Mattia Binotto say too early to give up on 2022 regs

Three of the team bosses including Toto Wolff have disagreed that the 2022 regulations need to be scrapped despite some teething problems.

The 2022 season saw one of the biggest overhaul in regulations in the sport’s history with the idea of promoting more exciting racing.

It also meant the established order was shaken up with established frontrunners like Mercedes finding themselves struggling in the midfield while last year’s backmarkers Haas were fighting for points.

There has been calls for changes to the rules, particularly from Toto Wolff in regards to porpoising, but when it was put to him, Guenther Steiner and Mattia Binotto if the rules should be thrown out, none of them were in agreement.

“I think it’s a bit early to say we give up on what we have done here,” Steiner said during a press conference in Canada. “We have done just a few races with these cars.

“These engineers are very good, and they will find a solution before we need to do something dramatic.

“I think there will be a time when we say: ‘how could we do this different?’ Or ‘if we change the regulation, can we make it go away?’ But in the moment, I think we need to stick with this regulation because I think, in general, they are not working badly.”

Wolff agreed and said more understanding of how the cars work under the new regulations is needed.

“I think we’ve seen cars that don’t have the issue,” he said. “And then others who have it have it worse, clearly.

“I can talk for our two drivers: they are having issues and it goes to a point that even a physio can’t fix it sometimes. So, we need to see how that develops. And understand also why it’s much tougher in some cars than in others.”

Ferrari boss Binotto spoke last of the three and agreed with Steiner that more progress can be made in the future.

He said: “Overall, if we judge Formula 1, I don’t think they are the least comfortable cars to drive, in terms of formula motorsport.

“I think that it’s a challenge for the drivers, no doubt. But still, I think those cars are quite comfortable to drive.

“I think [if] we look at ourselves, we made already made some progress, as Guenther said, I think in the future, we can do more progress. So, certainly too early to judge.

“I’m pretty sure we will find a solution, medium-long term. I think we need to accept it. It’s certainly something on which we all need to better understand to improve, but happy to do that.”