When Formula 1’s ground effect revolution first came into effect at the beginning at the start of the 2022 season, the aim was simple: Allow for closer, better racing.
By trying to give chasing drivers more of a chance against the dreaded ‘dirty air’ effect – the invisible force field that prevents drivers from getting close due to aerodynamic disturbance on their own cars – there should be more opportunities for drivers to attempt overtaking moves and, thus, improve the quality of racing.For over a decade leading up to 2022, the sport had relied heavily on the divisive Drag Reduction System to help give drivers a better chance to overtake. Allowed only in pre-determined sections of the track and only when within one second of a rival car, DRS has produced many hundreds of passing moves over the years, but, as many would argue, at the cost of driver skill. After all, why attempt a daredevil dive to catch an opponent unaware, when you can sit and wait until the DRS zone to press a button and then breeze by on the straight.
For the start of F1’s new ground effect era, DRS remained at it had been the previous season in 2021. The reasoning was not just to help provide a direct comparison between new cars and old, but because the shift to underbody-dominant downforce meant less overbody drag than with the 2021 cars. As such, the natural slipstream effect of following behind another car on a straight was reduced, with a weaker tow potentially making it harder for drivers to get by on straights.
“I think DRS, for us, is a very tune-able feature,” he said during an interview with Peter Windsor. “It’s very circuit-dependent and it can be dialled in and out.
“I think most of us feel, longer-term, we’d very much like to try and phase DRS out if we can. But we didn’t think that was necessarily going to be the right thing to do overnight for these regulations.”
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Two-and-a-half years into the new regulations, there is finally an end in sight for DRS – but not under the current rules. While the overtaking aid will be replaced with a new ‘manual override’ power unit boost when the revised V6 turbo power units come into effect in 2026, it will continue to be a major part of racing until then.
The majority of circuits have seen some modifications to their DRS activation zones in the ground effect era compared to their final races with the previous generation of cars. Suzuka, Shanghai, Monaco, Montreal, the Red Bull Ring, Silverstone, the Hungaroring, Circuit of the Americas, Interlagos and Yas Marina have all had their DRS activation zones untouched since the start of 2022 – although those final three tracks are yet to host their rounds this year. While both Albert Park and Singapore have both seen significant changes to their layout in recent years, they have retained the exact same DRS activation lengths in the regions of the tracks that were not modified.
A handful of tracks have seen at least one of their DRS zones extended since the start of 2022. After the return of the Dutch Grand Prix for 2021, the second and final DRS activation point on the track was moved from the exit of the final banked corner to the start, allowing drivers a greater benefit when pursuing a rival on the run to Tarzan at the start of the lap. The final DRS zone leading onto the pit straight at Mexico City was also extended by 158 metres for 2022, while Qatar’s sole zone was extended for its return to the calendar in 2023.
This year, two circuits have had DRS zones lengthened in a bid to try and provide better passing opportunities. The first was at Monza, where the DRS zone on the pit straight was moved over 100m closer to the exit of the final corner. Baku also saw its own zone along the pit straight extended before September’s race, however, this was simply reverting the change made the previous season, when it was shortened by 100m.
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Interestingly, there have been more circuits where DRS zones have been reduced by the FIA in the ground effect era compared to the previous generations of cars than tracks where they have been extended. The final zone in Bahrain was reduced by 80m in 2023 and remained that way this year, with 70m also chopped off the DRS zone along the pit straight at Jeddah. After its inaugural grand prix in 2022, the Miami circuit had two of its three DRS zones shortened, while the final one on the pit straight was kept as it was.
But while DRS zones are getting smaller more often than they are getting longer, there’s also more of them. The 2021 season saw a grand total of 46 DRS zones over the 22 rounds on the calendar, increasing to 49 for 2022 and then 50 last season. Through the first 18 rounds of the championship, drivers have had a total of 42 DRS zones at their disposal – a higher rate than any of the previous three seasons, helped by fourth zones added to both Albert Park and Singapore.
Assuming that each of the final six rounds retains identical DRS zones to last year, that will bring this year’s total to 54 zones over the 24 circuits – just slightly fewer on average than 2023.
It’s clear that the system will remain in use liberally until these current regulations are replaced after next season. Will the FIA’s goal of “nimble” cars succeed where the 2022 designs failed? The fact they will include a replacement for DRS indicates they expect not.
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Maisch (@maisch)
30th September 2024, 7:40
DRS overtakes are still not excting, drivers waiting for the whole lap for an easy DRS pass is not fun to look at. I think the implementation is worse than the technology itself, they should limit the use in a good way to make it more of a tactical element and dependent on skill.
Optimaximal (@optimaximal)
30th September 2024, 9:27
@maisch It’s so very F1 or FIA to simply decide the implementation they had was good enough, because it was their implementation. There’s been plenty of opportunity to experiment with concepts like time-limited deployment (like KERS), but there’s just been no appetite from the governing body to even touch it, which is strange as they fettle and fiddle with every other rule year in, year out.
Craig
30th September 2024, 13:13
I get a similar impression they refuse to look at other solutions other series’ use as they have it in their head theirs is the best and can’t be bettered.
Mark Tucker
1st October 2024, 7:58
Its one of the worst things about the sport at the moment imo (other than social media tribalism), its made overtaking too easy. You cannot really defend from it. Im really surprised that the drivers haven’t spoken out about it because it must be so frustrating to be unable to defend your position.
Not only that but because F2 is a proving ground for F1 talent they also introduced the DRS and guess what? Its too easy there now too. In F3 they seem to have the balance about right, sometimes its easy but drivers do seem to be able to defend quite well in the main.
I do think that the tyres and the fact you start the race 100kg heavier than qualifying also has quite a huge effect on the racing, more than we realise but yet again, talk of refueling is immediately shut down.
Joe Seph
30th September 2024, 7:44
Spa this year had less overtakes because of the wind. That helped George with defense to be the first across the finish line. Direction and speed of the wind is a big factor on DRS/tow effectiveness.
MichaelN
30th September 2024, 7:59
I think the amount of proper overtaking we see in the damp when there is no DRS bears further investigation by the powers that be. Is it the lack of grip that makes drivers hesitant and the increases the pace difference naturally, are the tyres less sensitive to going off line, are lower speeds making it easier to outbrake others?
The cars are only a part of the problem, and while I’m unconvinced by this spec, one cannot deny that races without DRS have not been stale trains of cars. There’s more to it, and given everything else we see in F1, it would not be surprising if the tyres had a lot to do with it.
Nick T.
30th September 2024, 22:33
Exactly, this is a poorly thought analysis. There are too many factors to just say “they’re keeping DRS, therefore these rules didn’t work.” As I said below:
MacLeod (@macleod)
30th September 2024, 8:07
The DRS is less effective as it’s downforce depended (How higher the downforce then the DRS is more effective, you see Mexico high downforce wings but DRS not noticeable because of the high altitude, MOnza loe downforce and DRS also not effective.
But the problem is the outwash groundeffect cars with not outwash is great to overtake.
The problem is the team were allowed to add aero which created a lot of outwash.
A solution could be to forbid outwash aero and only permit inwash. Or make the front wing as wide as between the front wheels.
Matthijs (@matthijs)
30th September 2024, 8:21
Close racing is not equal to passing. Therefore close racing can not be measured by counting the number of passes. If passing is equally difficult as in the previous situation, but there is more close racing and more passing attempts, then it is still a clear improvement. I am not saying that this is the case (I don’t have the numbers), but at least the measurement of close racing should be decided correctly before drawing conclusions.
albo94
30th September 2024, 8:52
I think this article fails to mention two important things:
1) Technical Directive 39 (introduced after the summer of 2022) has raised the floor of the cars, significantly increasing the dirty air effect.
2) The development over two seasons has made the aerodynamics of the cars much more complex, with a negative effect on overtaking.
In the early races of 2022, overtaking was significantly (and visually) better.
Señor Sjon
30th September 2024, 9:32
Indeed. The rules at the start of 22 were fine. TD39 and new floor rules for 2023 made matters a lot worse, increasing the dependancy on body/wing aero. They should have made the front wings fit between the front wheels width wise.
MichaelN
30th September 2024, 10:13
TD39 was one of the worst bits of officiating in recent F1 history. A whole new spec after years of study, and upended within months because people with a few too many awkward connections to the top couldn’t stomach merely being – imagine this – regular podium contenders.
PeteB (@peteb)
30th September 2024, 11:25
Sure but if you’re having to rip up a crucial part of the regulations because it doesn’t work on F1 cars, it’s hard to argue that the regulations are a success.
Christopher Rehn (@chrischrill)
30th September 2024, 10:02
I feel like two major problems exist with DRS:
1. Drivers wait until DRS is active, rather than trying to squeeze by somewhere else. This eliminates more tricky overtakes almost entirely
2. Cars are too large in width and length, meaning they can’t really be agile
To get rid of DRS, cars need to shrink so that it is again possible to go side by side. I know drivers complain about weight, which of course ties to size, but we need to shrink cars all over the place. Smaller front wings, smaller brakes, smaller sidepods, smaller floors, smaller rear wings. Then we can reduce the DRS dependency.
Jere (@jerejj)
30th September 2024, 11:20
Regarding the first point, drivers truly only do that on a few selected circuits, mainly Spa-Francorchamps, as overtaking is still far from guaranted on most circuits, especialy those that generally aren’t overtaking-friendly, which also means that they indeed attempt to squeeze elsewhere as well.
Jere (@jerejj)
30th September 2024, 11:18
I’d totally forgotten Mexico’s S/F straight zone extension for 2022, although Losail’s equivalent straight zone was actually 5 meters shorter last year than in 2021, albeit initially longer, while the Strip zone got extended during the weekend, for that matter.
However, I reiterate my point from some previous occasions that as FIA had already decided to stop shortening, they should’ve stuck with that rather than started redoing that for this year.
Jeddah’s & Imola’s main straight zones had zero justification for any amount of shortening, given neither the 2022 nor 2023 race featured a single easy-looking pass in the former, & following is harder this year than in both the last two, so unrealistic that the same starting point could’ve led to any with 2024-spec cars either, which is even more true for Imola, given the greater difference in following ability between 2022 & ’24-spec cars, not to mention the 2022 race didn’t feature any such passes either once DRS became activatable, while Montmelo’s main straight only featured some via magnifying factors, i.e., varying strategies & out-of-position starters rather than between two similarly-paced cars so that shortening happened for the wrong reasons.
The Kemmel straight shortening should’ve been done for last year, if ever, given the 2022 & ’23 races didn’t feature easy-looking passes in any higher amount, so impossible for ’24 to be any different, not to mention easy-looking passes still happened, even if mostly further down the field, so a rather useless reduction anyway.
Neither did any justification for Bahrain’s & Miami’s shortenings exist based on how the 2022 race went for both, for that matter.
However, Monza’s & especially Baku’s extensions could mean that FIA will fully return to the original/previous starting point for at least Miami’s, Imola’s, & Jeddah’s affected zones, if not also Montmelo’s for next season.
This season’s remaining six circuits will in all likelihood have the same starting points once again, or maybe the same as in 2021 for Losail, & in LV’s case, how the event ended, given that extension worked perfectly by not leading to a single easy-looking pass in the inaugural race & didn’t cause excessive DRS train effect.
All in all, most circuits have still had the same starting points throughout the current technical regulation cycle, with the majority among the last six being in this group.
PeteB (@peteb)
30th September 2024, 11:23
It was always the litmus test for me – if DRS is still required, the new rules have failed.
Coventry Climax
30th September 2024, 12:06
Essentially, Yes.
But there might be a little nuance in there, as the FiA -deliberately, it would seem- torpedoed it’s own original rules, seemingly in a change of plan and try to keep DRS after all.
Essentially, we’re not running GE cars all that much anymore, compared to the original rules. See the TD39 discussion above.
Or -take your pick-
– the FiA never intended to get rid of DRS in the first place but just lied about it to win us over, make the new rule set look better and more attractive than it actually was?
– the FiA had other motives to change the rules, and lied about their reasons because they didnt’want to tell us the actual reasons?
Somehow though, the word FiA always seems to pop up.
Craig
30th September 2024, 13:16
Certainly wouldn’t be the first or last time the FIA (or FoM) lied to force something into the sport.
DB-C90 (@dbradock)
30th September 2024, 13:24
Why we have now are these long DRS trains where everyone’s advantage gets nullified. It’s actually way worse than the old “Trulli trains we used to have” because at least back then a driver with skills had a chance of pulling off a proper overtake and drivers would at least attempt overtakes instead of waiting for a DRS zone in the hope that things might be different this lap.
I’d love to see them just not have DRS for a few races. My bet is that we’d actually see some far better racing if drivers were forced to engineer an attempt at a pass.
Jere (@jerejj)
30th September 2024, 14:29
@dbradock That’d only work on some very overtaking-friendly circuits, & even on those, racing wouldn’t necessarily be better, especially as drivers attempt passing elsewhere anyway, especially when a considerable delta via either tyres, car, or both is in play.
John Mitchell
2nd October 2024, 1:51
Agree entirely. The sooner DRS is dropped, we get back to real competitive racing
ECWDanSelby (@ecwdanselby)
30th September 2024, 14:33
The moment I saw DRS retained in the 2022 regs, I knew it’d be staying for the foreseeable. There’s absolutely no way Liberty will risk seeing a plumet in overtaking numbers. Not a chance.
Rob
30th September 2024, 15:21
Everyone knows the issues in F1. They cars are too heavy, too big and it’s open wheeled with aero parts that dictate dirty air. Equally arguably too fast…
F1 needs to fix the car size and weight issues first. It’s the biggest problem of why drivers cannot commit to overtakes or following offline.
notagrumpyfan
30th September 2024, 15:47
That’s only in name an end to DRS, as the negatives will remain, namely:
– drivers will opt for the ‘easy’ overtake in the new DRS (to be named Manual-Override-Mode or MOM);
– only chasing cars will have this artificial advantage, giving an unfair advantage to them over the defending car.
Yaru (@yaru)
30th September 2024, 19:47
Even if passing is easier, they’ll still keep it. They just want more overtakes period.
Neil (@neilosjames)
30th September 2024, 21:56
I think some sort of artificial aid will always be needed, because the root of all issues around overtaking is that the cars are too good, and we can’t unlearn all the advancements that have made them that way.
Watch some F1 cars from, say, 1990 – their aero, handling, the way they move about, etc. The aero was simple, the cars light and twitchy, dirty air was nowhere near as bad/impactful, there’d be little unpredictabilities in the car’s handling, tiny variations in line, braking points, traction, behaviour over bumps, and so on.
All those things could lead to closer racing and passing, but they’ve all gone now. Technology’d away. Modern cars are big aero-heavy artworks designed to be perfect in clean air, and even the worst cars on the grid glide around corners predictably and smoothly. There’s one optimum line that’s relatively easy to hit, especially when driving at ‘race pace’, and if you guide your giant four-wheeled computer along that optimum line, you’re going to dump so much dirty air onto the clean-air-optimised aero-computer behind that it won’t be able to operate within six or seven tenths of you. Which is too far back for a natural slipstream to be effective enough to pass even on a 1km straight, and way, way too far back for the idea of ‘outbraking’ to even cross the opponent’s mind.
It’s sad, but I just don’t see a way of avoiding gimmicks without somehow forgetting 30-plus years of ‘make cars perfect, refined, safe and fast’ tech.
Nick T.
30th September 2024, 22:32
This is a logical fallacy. Just because passing hasn’t increased dramatically doesn’t mean ground effects don’t make passing easier. We’ve seen cars can follow far more closely now. However, the field is much tighter. There are far fewer cars with dramatic pace differences, which is something we had more of pre-budget cap.
So, yeah, this is just a poorly thought out conclusion.
AlanD
1st October 2024, 1:59
I find it dull when a car can pull out, pass, and sail away with a massive speed advantage when they are still only half way down a straight. I feel DRS would be more valid if it was possible to remove it at the point when the passing car is alongside the car it is attempting to pass, like a more accurate simulation of slipstreaming. I can’t imagine how you could get DRS to work that way though.
It seems to me that the only way we will get back to driver skill being the key factor and increasing overtaking is by greatly reducing the size of the brakes, so that the margin for error in braking, both braking too early and braking too late, is much more significant. With current brakes, the bulk of a stright is at full throttle and only a short braking zone at the end
Matthijs (@matthijs)
1st October 2024, 7:26
I really like this idea. If you activate the DRS when the difference is less than 1 second, then you might be able to de-activate DRS when the difference is 0. The difficulty is that DRS detection is a fixed line, but the ‘DRS-deactivation’ is not.
Every time I see an article like this I think of your earlier comments: The popularity of F1 is not correlated to the number of overtakes. If it was, then we would all be watching karting.
Keith Campbell (@keithedin)
1st October 2024, 15:19
I think this would lead to some weird scenarios as drivers try to game the system in various ways. The way to pass with such a system would be to build up as much momentum as possible by the time you drew level with the car in front that you could slingshot past them before the DRS deactivation could take affect. But the leading driver would be aware of that too, and perhaps lift on the straight so that the attacking car draws alongside too early. So you would probably get a lot of situations where the attacking driver was ‘too close’ to make optimum use of the DRS, and would actually have a better chance of overtaking if he positions himself further back.
AlanD
1st October 2024, 22:20
Keith, that was just the way cars used to overtake in F1, before turbulence made it all but impossible. They’d slipstream up to the car in front and, if they timed it right, could slingshot their way past the car in front before the increased drag slowed them down again, or at least give them a chance of getting side by side for the next corner.
GregJ
1st October 2024, 4:17
Just my view. I think DRS can work well if the DRS zones are removed and replaced with a DRS ‘bank’. Each car is provided a set amount of time available for the entire race, the driver chooses when and where to execute it, and once all their DRS bank is consumed there is no more.
In addition, this process allows for varying allocations of DRS bank. Eg DRS time might be increased for back runners or removed as a penalty (instead of time penalties).
This puts DRS fully in the hands of the driver and team. They would manage it as they must manage tyres.
AlanD
1st October 2024, 22:40
Greg, I like the concept that DRS bank could be chopped as an alternative to time penalties, but worry that would also diminish penalties further. You’d have to lose a lot of DRS bank to equate to a five second time penalty, so I think they’d start handing out even more trivial penalties, such as one DRS activation per track limit violation. That also leads to drivers using penalties tactically, as in “I decided to overtake everyone by cutting the chicane because track position was worth more than DRS at that point in the race”.
billc
1st October 2024, 18:01
DRS would be so much better if the entire circuit was a DRS zone, and the driver was free to enable/disable it whenever they wanted. Make the total time per lap DRS can be enable variable per circuit, but leave it to the judgement of the drivers to determine when best to enable it. If a driver loses control for enabling DRS mid-corner, well now we have another metric by which to judge driver skill.
F1 has rendered the hairpin a non-passing zone, as they frequently are followed by a long straight with a DRS zone. Montreal for example hasn’t seen a competitive pass into the hairpin in years thanks the to DRS zone a bit past the exit of the hairpin.
AlanD
1st October 2024, 22:59
That appeals to me in one way, it feels fairer, but I think it would just lead to even less overtaking. There would be some optimum strategy for a circuit, the points where it is most productive to use DRS, and all the cars would play to that same strategy, or we’d get situations where the lead driver would be watching his mirrors and opening his own DRS the moment the challenger opened theirs.
The fact we are having these discussions shows F1 hasn’t solved the fundamental problem that F1 cars and tracks are not designed for overtaking, so we now think that a gimmicky DRS is somehow the solution. DRS only increases overtaking by giving an artificial car advantage to the car behind, and takes driver skill out of the equation. That’s why I think the answer is to forget about DRS and push to pass and all that and instead find ways to make the braking zones longer perhaps by mandating smaller brakes, maybe give the cars less downforce so they are slippier through the corners and harder to get the power down once they are on the straight, maybe make the cars smaller and shorter, and maybe come up with a workable rule that stops drivers being squeezed off track when trying to pass.