Ferrari’s downturn in performance has coincided with the re-emergence of Mercedes as a front-running team this season. With Lewis Hamilton set to leave the Silver Arrows at the end of this season for Ferrari, the pace differential could be playing on the mind of the seven-time world champion. Amid these developments, the team from Maranello are targeting a technical upheaval next year.
As things stand, Mercedes have won three out of the last five Grands Prix. They sit only 79 points adrift of Ferrari in fourth in the Constructors’ championship. Hamilton‘s imminent arrival at Maranello is going to mark a change in philosophy for the team’s 2025 challenger.
As per reports on X (formerly Twitter), Ferrari are planning to adopt a pull-rod suspension system from 2025 onwards. This change stems from the team’s wish to cater to Hamilton’s driving style which is predominantly in congruence with that of Charles Leclerc’s.
“Ferrari are to switch to a pull-rod front suspension with their F1 2025 car as the team prepare to welcome Lewis Hamilton from Mercedes, it has been claimed.”
“The move has been inspired by Hamilton’s driving style being closer in nature to that of Charles Leclerc than… pic.twitter.com/2cnwvlBjQi
— sim (@sim3744) August 14, 2024
The SF-24 currently uses a push-rod suspension on the front axle while the rear axle uses a pull-rod suspension system. Ferrari, along with customer team Haas, are the only teams on the grid that currently employ a pull-rod suspension towards the rear of the car.
In 2024, the likes of Red Bull, V-CARB, Sauber, and McLaren operate a pull-rod suspension on the front axle. If the reports are accurate, this would make Ferrari the only team to have similar suspension mechanisms working on both ends of their cars.
Ferrari do not seem interested in adopting a push-rod suspension in terms of their rear suspension for the foreseeable future. The team seems to have committed themselves to an “innovation” they believe to be best suited to their design objectives. Earlier this year, Ferrari’s technical director Enrico Cardile said (as quoted by Motorsport.com),
“We tested for a couple of years a push-rod suspension. We recorded good aero results moving towards this direction and when moving from pull-rod to push-rod, we didn’t measure a big advantage to justify some compromise in terms of weight or compliance.”
Aligning themselves to suit their drivers’ driving style might unlock the potential Ferrari needs to trump the competition moving forward.
