6 F1 teams including Red Bull and Ferrari opposing FIA's 2023 floor regulations: Reports

The FIA's proposed changes to floor regulations from the 2023 F1 season to combat porpoising are reportedly facing stiff resistance from more than half of the current F1 grid, according to Autosport.

Teams such as Ferrari, Red Bull, Alfa Romeo, Haas, and Williams have reportedly come out against the introduction of proposed regulation changes that would force a significant rethink of existing car designs.

Many, such as Red Bull’s Christian Horner, argue that the governing body shouldn’t be interfering in the matter since every team was handed the same regulations and only a few were seriously affected by porpoising.

Horner believes that the responsibility to ensure driver safety should be on the teams themselves since their design choices created the problem in the first place.

Meanwhile, others are reportedly concerned that the changes would negatively affect their performance while handing an advantage to rivals, particularly Mercedes, whom many accuse of “over-egging” its porpoising problems to force the FIA to act.

An unnamed team boss was quoted as saying:

“The changes are so extreme for 2023 because Mercedes claim that they have found 40% more downforce for next year, so they have urged the FIA to act. If Mercedes have genuinely done that, then you may as well hand them the world championship now.”

Despite opposition from teams, the FIA can force regulation changes on safety grounds. Article 1.2.2 of F1’s Technical Regulations allows the governing body to make any changes to the regulations on grounds of safety “without notice or delay” and doesn’t need to seek approval from a majority of teams.

In a statement released early last week, the FIA affirmed its commitment to safety and said:

“It is the responsibility and the prerogative of the FIA to intervene for safety matters, and the reason the regulations allow such measures to be taken is precisely to allow decisions to be taken without being influenced by the competitive position each team may find themselves in.”

Teams still have ways to prevent the changes from being implemented, however. Up to eight teams are reportedly lobbying FIA president Mohammed bin Sulayem to prevent the changes from moving forward by arguing that porpoising is not a genuine safety matter.

Additionally, Ferrari still retains its veto power to block certain regulatory changes if it believes that the changes will have an adverse impact on F1.

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Proposed changes to floor regulations for the 2023 F1 season

After several teams and drivers expressed concerns over the impact of porpoising on drivers’ physical health following the Azerbaijan GP, the FIA decided to intervene on safety grounds and has since issued a technical directive aimed at combating violent bouncing.

The technical directive was originally intended to take effect from the 2022 F1 French GP but has been postponed until the Belgian GP after the summer break. Furthermore, the regulations governing “flexi-floors” will also be clamped down on from Belgium onwards to prevent teams from exploiting the gray areas in the explore performance gains.

Meanwhile, the FIA considers the technical directive as an intermediate solution to proposing and following discussions with the Technical Advisory Committee over the Austrian GP weekend, announced plans to implement regulation changes governing the floor to stamp out porpoising entirely.

The new regulations would see the floor of the car being raised by 25mm from the current limit along with the “throat” of the diffuser. The FIA also intends to introduce more stringent lateral floor deflection tests to ensure that teams aren’t exploiting flexible floors to gain performance.

The regulations will likely have a significant impact on F1 grid in the upcoming season, while also have a major affect team’s expenses.