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A bold presentation and an even bolder livery marked the launch of a full-scale mock-up of Formula 1’s new era of cars coming into force in 2022.
But there wasn’t anything new of note. So was this just F1’s showmanship in the Liberty Media age putting style over substance?
In truth, there was a bit of embellishment about this unveiling. For starters, F1 wasn’t unveiling a 2022 car. It doesn’t have the capacity to do so. It’s not in control of the final version of what Ferrari or Red Bull or Williams will be designing for next year.
It was exactly what we characterised it as – a mock-up. All these images exist to do is give an idea of what the cars might look like. It’s a broad overview of the ruleset, an interpretation – just like the teams will be developing their own versions.
Furthermore, it’s been more than 18 months since the rules were first officially unveiled when we saw a windtunnel model and plenty of renders. Some images of this car show a few subtle differences, but ultimately this is nothing we’ve haven’t already seen before.
So, some were probably left thinking, ‘what’s the point? Why bother? Isn’t it a lot of effort for nothing really substantial?’. Well, yes. If it feels like something you’ve seen before, it’s because you have. You just haven’t seen a real-life version of it.
But that doesn’t mean this wasn’t worth it.
F1’s next-generation car was meant to be introduced this year but got delayed to 2022 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
So F1’s been relying primarily on a bunch of digitally created images with 2021 plastered all over them.
And, until now, only renders and an unliveried windtunnel model existed.
F1’s got a lot riding on the next generation of car and it’s very proud of the work that’s gone into this.
So, the bottom line is, F1’s got something to hype. So why not hype it? Especially as there are now much better, much more ‘real’ assets that can be used to build up to the 2022 season.
For starters, there’s no harm in a re-launch. There’s no sense of ‘ah, you’ve spoiled next year’s reveals!’ because it’d be surprising if any F1 car next year actually looked like this. After all, this isn’t F1’s attempt at replicating IndyCar or Formula E’s route by adopting a single-make chassis.
Back when the rules were first published, F1 actually mocked up three different variants. The idea was to show that the new regulations aren’t going to be too prescriptive and there are still plenty of design freedoms.
So, what we’ve seen here isn’t even the single, ratified F1 idea of what a 2022 car will probably look like. It’s simply one version of what it could be.
If anything, it adds to the narrative. What if we’re all being made to expect one thing next pre-season, then see something else entirely?
F1 is happy for the teams to be coming up with designs that don’t look like this. They’ve allowed a little more design freedom than initially intended so long as teams don’t do anything that contradicts the aims of the new rules. If that happens, the rules will be changed.
So, truthfully, no we probably haven’t learned anything about 2022 with this 2022 “launch”. If this was an exercise in portraying something truly new, then it would have been worthless.
But that wasn’t the point. This is F1 cashing in on some excitement in the short-term and also helping tell the story longer-term as well.
In that sense, it was a no-brainer.
