ROLL-HOOPS SET FOR MAJOR CHANGES FOR 2023

Formula 1’s Safety Commission has launched an inquiry into last Sunday’s scary crash, that amongst other issues saw Zhou Guanyu’s car lose its roll-hoop in the frightening incident.

During the start process of the British Grand Prix, the Alfa Romeo F1, scraped upside down for more than one hundred meters, first on tarmac, then on the gravel trap outside Silverstone’s Turn 1, losing the roll-hoop bar in the process, before somersaulting over the tyre barrier, crash – fortunately bottom first – into the safety net and the fall on the space between that net and the guardrails. Miraculously Zhou escaped the massive crash with almost no injuries.

Following the incident several things are under review, from the collapse of a roll-hoop structure that passed all the FIA-mandatory tests at first attempt, to the fact the gravel trap didn’t do anything to slow the Alfa Romeo down, to the presence of a small piece of tarmac between the end of the gravel trap and the tyre wall, that effectively launched the C42 over the protection barriers, to the gap between the safety net and the guard rails, where Zhou’s car landed.

That means there’s quite a lot of data to go through but the first priority is to understand how a safety structure that passed all mandatory crash and pull tests collapsed so quickly as soon as the Alfa Romeo was upside down and scratching on the tarmac.

It has already been pointed out Alfa Romeo remains the only team that has a single spike roll-hoop structure in its cars, a trend started by Mercedes back in 2010, copied by a couple of other teams but abandoned by all bar the Swiss team in the last few years.

In a fast and quick decision, the FIA could take would be to ban the use of single spike roll-hoop structures from the Technical Regulations and even going as far as imposing a standard design for the more traditional round structures.

That, paired up with an increase of the forces used on the crash and drag tests, would be the easiest way to try and solve the problem. While the Federation wants to avoid making knee-jerk reactions, the fact teams will start building their 2023 cars’ monocoques in less than three months puts the pressure on the regulator to come up with a quick solution that will prevent roll-hoop failures to happen again.

That’s why the head of the FIA, Mohammed Ben Sulayem is inclined to create a task force involving all teams, but also experts like Ross Brawn, Pat Symonds, Patrick Head and others, to quickly come up with a bullet proof solution for this problem, while appointing other people to look into the other issues Zhou’s horrifying crash brought up.

Preliminary conclusions are expected by the end of the month, around the Hungarian Grand Prix time, with recommendations and changes to the 2023 Technical Regulations are set to be introduced during the next FIA World Council for Motor Sport that will be held at the start of September in a location yest to be determined.

Given Sauber Alfa Romeo has strict protocols to make sure its cars are safe, it’s somehow ironic this is the third time an accident from one of its cars leads to changes in the Technical Regulations, as it was Karl Wendlinger’s 1994 qualifying crash in Monaco that led to the introduction of mandatory high head protections around the cockpit of the cars.

Another Formula 1 crash which saw Pedro Diniz’s roll in the Nurburgring in 1999, led to the introduction of pull and drag tests to the roll-hoops of Formula One cars as the structure had been ripped off as the Brazilian’s car dug and dragged on the grass after being tipped into a roll in the second corner of the German track.

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