Formula 1 Las Vegas GP

Ferrari's Las Vegas experiment that offers clues to 2025 push

Ferrari did something unusual in Las Vegas with a floor experiment in practice

Matt Somerfield Giorgio Piola

Published: Nov 26, 2024, 9:02 AM

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Carlos Sainz, Ferrari SF-24

Photo by: Ferrari

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Ferrari kick-started its 2025 plans in a public way at the Las Vegas Grand Prix as it ran a new floor that was purely experimental and was never actually intended to be raced with now.

It ran on Carlos Sainz’s SF-24 during free practice in a bid to help the Scuderia gather some vital information that can help its understanding in bringing the perfect floor design for next season.

The gap between the real world and simulations has never been wider than with this generation of cars, with the floor and its ancillary components the most difficult of those to master.

Most of the grid has, at one point or another, written off a new development stream during this regulation set, as it has not delivered the performance that had been expected. Ferrari itself fell foul of a floor that introduced high-speed bouncing from the Spanish GP.

So it is no surprise that the Scuderia used its Las Vegas development to act as a valuable learning tool to see if the information coming out of its refurbished wind tunnel is good enough to translate to the track.

Ferrari SF-24 floor comparison

Photo by: Giorgio Piola

The experimental floor is interesting for a number of reasons.

There is not one specific design avenue that was adjusted, rather it was an all-encompassing refresh that covered the floor fences, forward expansion of the underfloor, the floor’s edge and the sidewall of the diffuser ramp.

However, one aspect that’s perhaps more intriguing than the rest is the design of the edge wing, as it is one we’ve seen from Ferrari before, both in 2022 and 2023.

However, the team saw fit to head in a different direction when it couldn’t quite unlock the performance it expected to deliver.

The slender L-shaped rear section to the edge wing has been seen on other cars too, suggesting that it’s a solution that looks good by the numbers but perhaps requires other pieces of the jigsaw puzzle all to fit together to get the absolute most from it.

For example, this variant not only has a flatter surface relative to the ground along its length, but it also requires adaptations be made to the metal support brackets, as the degree of flexibility needed from it may vary somewhat when compared to the current solution.

Of course, we won’t know the full extent of the changes that have been made to this floor, as there’s clearly a set of corresponding alterations made to the underfloor, which aren’t visible to us.

Ferrari SF-24 front wing, Las Vegas GP, Italian GP comparison

Photo by: Giorgio Piola

Ferrari’s other change for Las Vegas was a minor alteration to its front wing, whereby the trailing edge of the upper flap was trimmed more than it was at Monza.

This is aimed at offering a better balance for the car as well as a boost to straightline speed.

Paired with this was Ferrari's lowest-downforce rear wing assembly, which the team used at Monza, alongside a single-element, short-chord beam wing.

Ferrari SF-24 rear view comparison, Las Vegas GP

Photo by: Giorgio Piola

In the side-by-side comparison it’s clear that whilst the car does appear to be set-up in a similar manner to Monza aerodynamically speaking, the approach was distinctly different when it came to cooling.

The engine cover louvres were more closed in Las Vegas, owing to the lower temperatures.

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