Rumors
'Ferrari to adopt Mercedes' 2019 strategy at winter testing'
- Nicolás Quarles van Ufford
According to the Italian branch of Motorsport.com, Ferrari will essentially do what Mercedes did at winter testing in 2019 in a few weeks' time, with the Silver Arrows not impressing at the Circuit de Catalunya last year before turning up with a significantly quicker car in Melbourne.
Ferrari looked the quickest team last campaign in Barcelona and were even dubbed championship favourites by most, with their straight-line speed looking significantly better than any other team.
However, once the Australian Grand Prix rolled around some weeks later, it was Mercedes who were utterly dominant, locking out the front row in qualifying and winning the race in a one-two while Ferrari couldn't even get on the podium.
Franco Nugnes of Motorsport.com has reported Ferrari want to adopt a similar strategy to their rivals at winter testing; use an 'old' spec on the car for the first week of testing with a car that's just mechanically up-to-date to collect data and only bolt on the latest aerodynamic updates for the final three days of testing (February 27th-29th). This gives the engineers in Maranello an extra week to develop the 2020 challenger even more
The first week will therefore just be used to check for reliability and if everything is working the way it should mechanically. Don't expect them to light the timesheets on fire from February 19th-21st.