Former F1 driver Anthony Davidson expects a continuous shake-up throughout the field during the course of the 2022 season.
The 2022 F1 season will see big changes in regulation take shape. Teams have now been preparing for these changes, for well over a year. At last week’s pre-season testing in Barcelona, the outfits and drivers got to try out their 2022 challengers on track for the first time, to gather sufficient data and insight ahead of the first race in Bahrain next month.
The last major regulation change in F1 took place back in 2014 with the introduction of the turbo-hybrid engines. It turned out to an era dominated by Mercedes, with Red Bull being the only serious threat to them in 2021.
Now that a new era of F1 is just around the corner, all teams have the chance to start from scratch. In particular, many expect the likes of McLaren and Ferrari to make a major push up the field.
After the first pre-season test in Barcelona last week, Sky Sports pundit and former F1 driver Anthony Davidson shared his thoughts on the upcoming campaign. Davidson stated that it was too early to make any predictions.
The Brit feels that all teams will field a completely different car at the next testing in Bahrain in March. Data and results taken from these runnings will be put to use, and the car designs are expected to be altered.
A shake-up within the F1 field would be great for the sport, says Anthony Davidson
Davidson went on to suggest that teams would constantly focus on developing their cars throughout the campaign. The first race in Bahrain may provide us with surprises, but the strongest team that day may not get the final laugh in the end.
“I think it is too early to say at the moment who has the edge or not,” he said to Sky Sports. “The cars will roll up in Bahrain and be very different to the cars we saw in Barcelona.”
“This was just an early test for all the teams to go through the system checks. We saw lots of unreliability, lots of red flags coming out so very early days.”
“Then it is just a shifting scale throughout the season with these new cars as they are finding so much time in the wind tunnel all the time. It is going to be an ever-changing thing as the season goes on which is great,” he continued.
“I want to see close competition so hopefully these new rules have really allowed us closer competition throughout the year.”
