I m not normally given to dark thoughts, but I really believe we were visited by some particularly cruel and sinister demons that May weekend. Even on the Thursday, the day the teams gathered in Imola, there seemed to be a palpable sense of foreboding hanging over the paddock. Perhaps some people might choose to avoid saying as much, but I also suspect that I m not alone in harboring this uneasy feeling. Certainly the fronts would benefit from this, but the aerodynamicists start to get a mite twitchy at suggestions like that. In a perfect world the aerodynamicists would prefer not to have any ducts on the car at all.
Ducts produce drag, but no downforce.
This is not a situation that sits well with aerodynamicists. If ducts produced downforce but no drag, then cooling the brakes would never become an issue. Every year the teams send their cars to Imola equipped with brake ducts that everyone knows are way too small. Sure enough, the brakes overheat during Friday s practice sessions. On Friday night the teams fit bigger ducts in readiness for Saturday.