Lando Norris believes Formula 1’s bouncing phenomenon is not only still a present issue following the emergence of porpoising in 2022 and needs improving ‘”long-term.”
When F1 switched back to ground effect-centric aerodynamic regulations for 2022, teams and drivers discovered extreme vertical oscillations (bouncing) where cars would bottom out under aerodynamic load, thus stalling the aero and sending the floor upward, before loading aero again and bottoming out.
The oscillations were commonly referred to as porpoising and plagued drivers throughout the 2022 season, becoming a health concern due to the stresses imposed on the back.
Concerns grew until regulations were imposed to mitigate the issue and in 2023 the FIA rulebook mandated that floor edges were to be raised by 15mm.
Still, bouncing isn’t eradicated from ground effect cars completely and the McLaren driving contingent of Norris and Oscar Piastri gave their thoughts on the issue following the theory that both Alex Albon (Italian GP 2022) and Carlos Sainz (Saudi Arabian GP 2024) contracting appendicitis within the space of a few years could be connected to bouncing.
“I don’t know how you would correlate it,” said Norris after Friday’s qualifying in Jeddah. “I’m not a doctor, so I’m not going to say much.
“It’s definitely not as bad as what it was two years ago. So things have improved since then with the porpoising and all of this, but you still have to run the cars extremely low and stiff.
“This takes a toll on you. I still struggle a lot with my body and back and all of these things.
“I have to do a lot now, which I didn’t have to do a few years ago. So I wouldn’t say it’s directly because of the car. I think a bit of it is just naturally for me.
“I think things in the long term need to be improved, especially if I’m going to be here for many years.”
Piastri added: “I feel like we’ve done a good job addressing it, but it is something that we need to keep an eye on in the future.
“Like Lando said, at the end of the day, we’re going to drive the car however it’s quickest and you’re never going to give up lap time for having an achy body after the race.
“You kind of need rules to stop that from us because we’re so competitive that we’re just going to get the ultimate lap time out no matter what it takes.”
McLaren boss Andrea Stella said that the 2022 regulations produced “unintended challenges,” before looking toward solutions being defined within the 2026 technical regulations.
“We have gone a long way in understanding these challenges, and this is also the reason why these cars are much more comfortable to drive now, but can still be quite tricky,” he said.
“If you take the high-speed section, still they tend to bounce a little bit, to have a little bit of porpoising, and the cars can get pretty snappy because of this phenomenon.
“So, it’s not only the comfort, it’s also how much on the edge the car becomes when it starts to have these dynamic oscillations.
“All this learning should definitely be taken into account in designing the 2026 regulations, especially if they are a derivation with smaller cars, like they are intended to be, but fundamentally a derivation of the ground-effect cars that we are running at the moment.
“It would be an inconvenient and incomplete job if in 2026 the cars have similar kind of issues like in 2022.”
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