Sergio Perez and Carlos Sainz Jnr admit dirty air could become more of a concern in Jeddah and across the rest of the 2024 season.
The sport introduced radical new ground effect aerodynamic concepts for the 2022 season in a bid to promote closer racing due to the ‘dirty air’ effect.
The turbulent air generated by a leading car affects those chasing it. This effect was supposed to be lessened by new technical regulations introduced in 2022 which reintroduced ‘ground effect’ aerodynamics.
However, the opening race of the 2024 season in Bahrain featured little racing towards the front after the early laps. Max Verstappenwon comfortably from pole, with Red Bull team mate Perez finishing around 20 seconds behind in second, chased by Sainz in third. Sainz finished three seconds behind Perez and claims he struggled to get much closer because of the affect of dirty air.
“I was in a bit of an uncomfortable position, because you’re there in the two, three-second margin, which is where you get all the dirty air, but you don’t get the advantage of the DRS and the slipstream, so you’re just sliding a bit more,” Sainz explained.
“If I would have been within a second or maybe five seconds behind, I think on the hard tyre I could have maybe showed a bit more the true pace of the car and my pace. But in that two, three seconds is the worst place to be and I could never mount any proper challenge on Checo.”
Perez expects it will prove harder for drivers to follow closely to rivals this season than it has over the last two seasons, especially once they’ve fallen out of DRS range.
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“I saw Carlos, he lost DRS early on and he was just out of contention for a while,” Perez said. “The car ahead going straight into the clean air, is basically going on his own, has to use more of his tyres, so it’s a bit of a disadvantage if you are fighting.
“I think, in places like Baku or even Jeddah… I think the racing is going to be different. It does create a difference to the car ahead in the first few laps. So, it’s going to be interesting, I think.”
F1 has changed its DRS rules for this year, allowing drivers to use it a lap earlier than last year in grands prix, in order to increase overtaking.
Perez believes drivers will have to weigh whether they want to push harder on their tyres to keep within DRS of rivals or back off slightly to prioritise preserving their tyres over a stint.
“I think a lot of…
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