Ferrari to unveil 2022 contender in mid-February

Ferrari will pull the covers off its all-new 2022 car in mid-February, in the week that will precede the start of pre-season testing at Barcelona on February 23.

The Scuderia's 2022 charger, designed to the specifications of Formula 1's new regulation platform that aims to bring the racing closer together, has yet to receive its name according to team boss Mattia Binotto.

"The car will be presented middle of February," confirmed Binotto, speaking at Ferrari's annual Christmas media event.

"We have not decided yet the date. From the 16th to the 18th of February, that will be the date, but it’s something that will be finalised in the next weeks."

Elaborating on the Italian outfit's prospects for next season, Binotto said that its car's development was following a positive course.

But the Swiss engineer steered clear of predicting where Ferrari may sit in the pecking order as there were simply too many unknowns regarding the Scuderia's rivals.

"We know that we have no references to the others and the competitors, that’s the most difficult one," the Swiss engineer explained.

"We have no guide on what is going on with the others. But it’s important for me to know that we are reaching our objectives and it’s progressing to plan.

"The new regulations are a clear opportunity. The hope is to be competitive and for me to be competitive is to be in the position of winning races.

"Would that mean that we can fight for a championship? If I look at today, the gap is still big. But as Ferrari, it’s part of our DNA.

"What is important is to be capable of fighting at least in some races for pole and for the win.

"That is the simple consequence of continuous growing and improvement. I would be disappointed if we have not improved [compared] to this year."

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Binotto also revealed that Ferrari's 2022 power unit will feature a "significantly different" ICE, designed to comply with F1's new fuel.

"There will be some changes to the hybrid system for 2022 as first for the regulations because more sensors are acquired from FIA in all the systems for better promising," he explained.

"But the overall system is very similar to the one we raced at the end of the season. But the rest, especially on the internal combustion engine, I have to say is significantly different.

"We’ve got a new fuel, which is the 10% ethanol, which changed a lot the combustion.

"Just considering that different fuel, whatever is the supplier so he’s not down to the supplier, but we are losing more or less 20 horsepower, which means somehow the combustion itself is quite changed.

"So there were a lot of opportunities in development on the power unit and we changed it quite a lot, especially in the design of the combustion itself.

"On the chassis, what can we innovate? I think that the way we approach the exercise was really open-minded and when looking at the car concept, what was possible or not – which is not only the external shapes but whatever you could have done under the bodywork in terms of layout, in terms of suspension design, in terms of the architecture, including as well the power architecture.

"I think that the team made significant innovations and the overall design that we are now formalising is quite different to the 2021 project."

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