The smiles are back at Alfa Romeo, after the best qualifying held in a long time. Zhou and Bottas take the C43 respectively to the fifth and seventh pitch of the starting grid, putting themselves in the best conditions to aim for the double overtaking in the constructors’ championship against Williams and Haas. The Hinwil stud farm is Budapest’s big Saturday surprise, a result of several factors. The affinity with the Hungarian track is accompanied by the latest updates to the car, but above all the excellent management of the alternative qualifying format.
Silverstone updates
Alfa Romeo showed up in Budapest without any updates. However, just two weeks earlier at Silverstone the team had introduced important innovations. The updates had affected every aspect of the bottom: Venturi channels, vertical grille and diffuser. To these were added new fairings for the rear suspension arms, as well as new cooling ducts for the brakes. Unfortunately, the changes, mainly concentrated in the lower part of the car, are not easily noticeable from the outside. However, Xevi Pujolar, head of track engineers, reveals what the goal of the latest developments made at Hinwill was: “We brought a new package to Silverstone and it worked. he mostly concentrated on medium-high speed cornering. It was a step in the right direction.”
Although the debut of the updates took place in England, it was only in Budapest that Alfa Romeo was able to extract its true potential. As also seen in the ranks of the competition, it often happens that after each development the team needs one or two races to understand how to adjust the set-up choices, on all heights from the ground, to which the aerodynamics of the surface are extremely sensitive. It is therefore not surprising that in commenting on the qualification in Budapest, Alessandro Alunni Bravi refers to the optimization of the package: “By refining the developments we introduced at Silverstone, We managed to extract that extra performance that we needed to take a leap forward”.
The innovations at Silverstone have broken a long period of fasting with regard to development at Alfa Romeo. In fact, the latest news dated back to the Monaco Grand Prix, where the C43 had been updated to the bellies and always to the bottom. The next pieces are now expected upon returning from the stop and will not only affect the aerodynamic front, as Pujolar reveals: “For the next races after the break we have production some updates regarding the mechanics and aerodynamics”.
Track factor
Silverstone had hidden the true potential of the updated C43, a car not particularly efficient from an aerodynamic point of view unlike its direct rival Williams. Alfa Romeo on the contrary has traction is one of its strong points, quality daughter also of the setting of the 2023 project where the work was concentrated above all in the rear of the single-seater. While on the one hand the Budapest track hid the car’s shortcomings on the straight, on the other it enhanced its agility in slow motion.
However, the top management of the team is also keen to underline the good management on the track by the team in a complex weekend for everyone, between the alternative format of qualifying and the two fewer sets of tires available. Alfa Romeo, for example, was the only one, together with the two AlphaTauris and Stroll’s Aston Martin, to test the harder compound in advance during the last free practice session. The choice was praised by both riders, who arrived more ready in Q1 and passed the gap without too many problems. In view of the race, the unknown element of tire degradation remains, apart from which, however, the progress made by Alfa Romeo from a technical and sporting point of view remains.
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