The Spanish Grand Prix was supposed to be a reset for many teams after the FIA announced its plans to introduce a clampdown on front wing designs.
Suspicions had been raised by teams last season after McLaren were found to be using a rear wing that deformed under aerodynamic load during the Azerbaijan GP.
Oscar Piastri won the race ahead of Charles Leclerc, but video footage afterwards appeared to show the team was using a trick rear wing that had a ‘Mini DRS’ system that generated a small opening in the small slot gap to give them extra straight-line speed.
Red Bull raised concerns in 2024 that this was being done with front wings but were left furious, after the FIA announced a crackdown in 2025 ahead of the season for the Spanish Grand Prix.
Discussing the changes on Peter Windsor’s latest YouTube livestream, F1 aero expert Peter Wright believes the teams are exploiting an area of front wing design that the governing body has no control over anyway.
FIA told they have ‘no control’ over key front wing design area after Spain clampdown
Wright worked as an engineer between the 1960s and 1990s in F1, and had a significant influence on the application of aerodynamics, having helped pioneer ground effects while working for Lotus in the 70s.
He believes the stricter tests from the FIA, which stipulate that a front wing cannot bend more than 15mm under load, are redundant and that the governing body has no control over the specific design area where the teams have focused.
“I think they [McLaren] have achieved, very cleverly, a front wing where you can put on however much you want at speed to get rid of low-speed understeer, and that doesn’t give you a lot of high-speed oversteer. Because it washes out the front wing with [aero] load,” said Wright.
“It’s exactly what you want. But unfortunately, under the FIA regulations, no one has control of incidents with the wing or the flap, only the bending. I think that is why nothing changed in the Spanish Grand Prix.”
McLaren doing some ‘very clever things’ with front wing
Guenther Steiner thinks the clampdown in Spain made McLaren faster, as they comfortably won the race by 10 seconds from Charles Leclerc.
Wright believes McLaren has implemented a clever design trick that has enabled them to generate some deformation of the front wing at high speed without it impacting the load tests.
“It’s known in the aircraft industry that as primary structures go more towards composites, the layout of the plies are used to tune the structural deformation of wings. I’m quite sure they are well into that.
“As you sweep the wing [upwards], the centre of downforce is behind the mounting point. Therefore, it must twist the mounting point. It twists nose up on a racing car, and it reduces downforce. So there are some very clever things going on in that wing structure.”
McLaren were one of the few teams, along with Mercedes, that did not bring a new front wing to Spain, while Red Bull and Ferrari both introduced new specifications in response to the increased load tests.
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