The aerodynamic rule tweaks for 2021 appear to have hurt teams running to a low rake design philosophy – like Mercedes – more than those running a high rake one, like Red Bull. But according to Mercedes Team Principal Toto Wolff, simply shifting his team’s design philosophy towards Red Bull’s for this season is not the solution to the Silver Arrows’ problems.
The rake angle of a car – the angle at which the floor slopes up from the front to the rear – is a crucial aspect of a team’s design philosophy. Mercedes have traditionally favoured a low rake design that makes the car more aerodynamically efficient, while Red Bull’s approach has been to use an aggressive, high rake angle to increase underbody downforce – a design philosophy Chief Technical Officer Adrian Newey has favoured since back in his Williams days in the 1990s.