This weekend, the Miami Grand Prix will be held for the first time on a new track, which the drivers could only study on the simulator in preparation for the stage. That is why Ferrari gave the floor to Enrico Sampo before the start of the weekend in Florida – in the Scuderia he manages the work program on the simulator.
Q: In modern Formula 1, digital simulation technologies have largely replaced on-track testing. How do you help the team prepare for the race weekend?
Enrico Sampo: The simulator is one of the most important tools when preparing for a race. The work starts a few weeks before the Grand Prix with us analyzing last year’s race at this track, if possible.
The test driver then spends several sessions in the simulator to get an idea of the tire behaviour, predict the car’s balance, check the effectiveness of certain components and finally try out different settings.
The riders and their engineers spend a session on the simulator a few days before the stage and give input to the preparation process and the choice of settings. When it comes to racing on a new track, such as Miami, Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz also use the simulator to get to know the track and practice different work routines that will then be repeated over the weekend.
Question: At what point do you usually notice that working on a simulator gives the desired effect?
Enrico Sampo: This usually happens on Friday during the first practice, when the team gets the first information and comments from the riders about the real circuit. After that, we can already compare it with the data obtained on the simulator.
When there is a podium on a new track, such as in Miami, it is also important to check everything with real information about it, including the nature of the curbs, and to understand if there are any points that have not been taken into account in the model that we worked on the simulator.
As the weekend progresses, the degree of correlation between the car’s behavior on the real track and on the virtual track increases, although it is of course very important that the basic information is already accurate enough so that the engineers can immediately concentrate when finding of fine adjustments.
Q: Miami is a completely new track, which made the work on the simulator even more important. What can be said about the characteristics of this ring and how did you and the riders prepare for this stage?
Enrico Sampo: Yes, in this case the value of the simulator is increased. We foresee that the speeds on this track will be high, in the first sector of the circle there are several fast corners, but there are also slow ones, especially in the third sector.
There are three DRS zones on long straights, making for good overtaking opportunities. In terms of balance, the track is difficult, so it is very important to find the right compromise in working with the settings so that the car handles different types of corners well and is fast on the straights.
In preparation for this leg we have followed our usual procedures, trying to be as accurate as possible as we are not entirely sure of the correctness of the course information. This means we had to spend more time anticipating different types of conditions and potential problems.
Charles and Carlos worked hard on the simulator, studying the track and trying to understand the limits of the car as well as different approaches to settings to optimize the car’s balance and get good lap times.
Source: F1 News
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