Ferrari evaluated its new features for India during straight-line testing

At the beginning of the season, few people would have predicted that with four Grand Prix left in the championship, Fernando Alonso and Ferrari would be in second place in both standings, with a real chance of winning the driver’s title. The Italian team, which has already made a substantial development effort to make the F2012 a regular podium contender, does not intend to give up so close to the goal, as confirmed by Nikolas Tombazis: “We clearly approach the last four races with more performance to gain on our main rivals, which means we cannot be on the defensive but on the attack. We plan to bring updates for each race and try to close the gap on Red Bull and fight with them for victory, hoping to bring the title home,” ambitions Ferrari’s chief aerodynamicist in a video posted on the team’s official website.

In South Korea, Felipe Massa evaluated new parts that should feature on the F2012 during the Indian Grand Prix. Article 22.4 of the sporting regulations allows any team to conduct four straight-line test days throughout the season. Ferrari, once again facing issues with the correlation of results between the wind tunnel and the track, decided to invite young Davide Rigon to one of these sessions, on October 18th, in Idiada, Spain: « When you have components that seem to bring improvements in the wind tunnel but don’t translate to the track, you have to be very cautious and we organized an aerodynamic test to evaluate and refine these components. This was done before the Indian Grand Prix, and we received some interesting answers and clear indications of what wasn’t working, » confides Nikolas Tombazis.

If the Greek is reasonably satisfied with Ferrari’s current situation compared to the start of the season, he nevertheless acknowledges that the men from Maranello hoped to do better in recent races: We have brought some new features to the car that we hoped would allow us to reduce the gap, but it didn’t materialize for various reasons and it was clearly a source of frustration for us. We had to think hard about what hadn’t worked and tried to fix it. I am not satisfied with the last few months but, overall, it’s OK and I hope that during the last four races, we will be satisfied again.

While Luca di Montezemolo recently told the *Gazzetta dello Sport* that Ferrari would shut down its wind tunnel during the winter for an upgrade, Nikolas Tombazis discussed the issues the Scuderia is facing with facilities that are now behind the best: « The correlation between the wind tunnel results and on-track performance is not black or white, it’s not either you have it or you don’t, there are degrees. There can be a lack of correlation for many different reasons: the quality of the airflow, the scale of the car, the size of the wind tunnel, geometry differences, etc. For us, what is clear is that we have certain areas where we have failed to bring performance to the car; there are undeniable problems we need to solve. Compared to some of our rivals, our wind tunnel is now somewhat outdated, and we believe it is no longer cutting-edge in some areas, so we have decided to proceed with a major upgrade. It’s going to take time, several months, and since we cannot stop development during that time, we will rent another wind tunnel. » The Greek engineer also believes that this will allow, through comparison of results, to better pinpoint the problems of their own wind tunnel in order to resolve them as quickly as possible.

But in the meantime, the Scuderia still has four races to go and will have new parts ready for next weekend, for the Indian Grand Prix. According to *Autosprint*, the F2012 could arrive at the Buddh circuit with a different rear wing, modified brake ducts, new fins under the noses, modified aerodynamic struts at the pontoons, and new exhaust outlets. Innovations that have been validated in the Toyota wind tunnel in Cologne and are therefore subject to the track verdict at Idiada.