Sauber pin Spanish GP hopes on rear wing upgrade

2013 Spanish Grand Prix

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Sauber are hoping their aerodynamic upgrades for the Spanish Grand Prix will move them up the field after a disappointing start to the season.

A revised rear wing is among the aerodynamic changes planned for the C32 at next week’s race.

Head of track engineering Tom McCullough said: “We have some further aero updates, including a modified rear wing, and we will be evaluating these during Friday practice.”

“Qualifying is particularly important here as overtaking can be difficult in the race,” he added. “Our target for the race is to finish with both cars in the points.”

Nico Hulkenberg led the Chinese Grand Prix for the team but fell to tenth by the chequered flag. That and his eighth-place finish in Malaysia have given the team just five points from the first four races, 27 less than they had this time last year.

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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14 comments on “Sauber pin Spanish GP hopes on rear wing upgrade”

  1. JPQuesado (@joao-pedro-cq)
    3rd May 2013, 10:50

    Hope they don’t pin to much on it, otherwise it could break. :)

  2. so there is no fundamental problem, just a rear wing change to elevate them up the grid?

    1. There’s more than one.

      A revised rear wing is among the aerodynamic changes planned for the C32 at next week’s race.

      Most of their problems are at the rear end, and getting the coanda in the sweet spot to work properly. It’s a bit more difficult to figure out with the C32’s sidepod system, however, as the air is flowing around the pods rather than over/under. I’ll be intrigued to see what their performance is like once they’ve cracked it – as there’s a reason they went down that route as opposed to sticking with the pretty solid C31.

      1. fine so more than sauber, hulkenberg would want this package to work, otherwise he will be kicking himself for leaving force india.

  3. Nick.UK (@)
    3rd May 2013, 11:43

    I can’t help but get frustrated at Hulkenberg for leaving Force India (obviously with the hindsight that FI’s car is much better this year, and Sauber’s is much worse). I really hope it doesn’t damage his career progression. I really want to see him in a top team.

    1. every time a key personnel leaves Force India they seem to do better than their rival team who hired that personnel…

      1. MB (@muralibhats)
        3rd May 2013, 12:10

        So keep making people leave :) DiRista next ? :)

      2. Who arrived at Sauber from Force India this year on the technical side? I didn’t hear anything. Or are you just referring to Hulk?

  4. Obviously Sauber are desperate to get in front of Toro Rosso after that superb performance by Ricciardo in China which which was unexpected. He is determined to stay in F1 longer and a drive for Red Bull replacing the Australian Webber

  5. @william

    Obviously Sauber are desperate to get in front of Toro Rosso after that superb performance by Ricciardo in China

    I highly doubt Ricciardo can reproduce a performance like that one! To me that was just a freak one-off performance. Vergne to me is much better but I feel that STR/RBR are utting all their weight behind the aussie.

    1. Motor_mad (@)
      3rd May 2013, 16:50

      And what evidence do you have that STR prefer Ricciardo exactly? A freak one off performance in a car that is inconsistent sounds about right. At the end of the day it was Ricciardo who delivered the result, not Vergne.

      1. It has been reported that Marks seat is in jeopardy as Dr Helmut Marko believes Ricciardo is the better one and speculation is that Ricciardo is in pole for Webbers seat

  6. PMccarthy_is_a_legend (@pmccarthy_is_a_legend)
    4th May 2013, 16:20

    Now I know there are some very clever people working at Sauber, and not for a second will I pretend to know more about F1 cars than they do (as often is the case among the comments in this website!) but one has to ask what happened to a car that was quite competitive in 2012. There are no major reg changes and tyre management still at a premium, as it was last year. Where did it go wrong for then? Williams is on the same boat, they seem to have got the design wrong this year. Why not to stick to a design philosophy that seemed to produce good results in 2012? A case of trying to be too clever?

    1. Motor_mad (@)
      4th May 2013, 20:45

      I will judge them mid way through the season. If they are still dog slow then i will question them. If they are consistently quicker than the likes of Force India then i will praise them. Although it does seem like a strange decision for two relatively low budget teams to make.

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