Sainz happy with limited aero freedom under 2021 proposals

Carlos Sainz would welcome a lack of aerodynamic design freedom under the revised Formula 1 technical regulations for the 2021 season, believing it would help create closer on-track racing.

F1 officials are set to rule on the proposed regulation changes for 2021 on Thursday following months of negotiations, having shelved plans to make a final decision on the rules back in April.

One of the big points of contention for some teams has been the lack of design freedom proposed under the new rules, prompting figures to warn against F1 limiting creativity and risk becoming more like a spec-series.

But McLaren driver Sainz said he would be happy to see F1 opt for a tighter set of aerodynamic rules, believing they would help bring the field closer together for 2021 before opening up development further down the line.

“I’ve been talking to various people, and probably most of them can see that the car at the moment, it’s very tight on regulations, so teams are not going to be able to do much,” Sainz said.

“At the moment, you talk to some aerodynamicists, and they’re not very happy about it. For me as a driver, I actually really like it, because it means hopefully the field could be tighter in ’21.

“And then as the regulations develop, you could maybe start opening little windows of development for the people to develop.”

F1 has released some initial images of what it believes the 2021 car will look like, including a 50 percent scale model running in a wind tunnel.

Sainz said that while he preferred the look of the current cars, he did not think the 2021 models would end up looking as bad as the infamous 2014 chassis.

“I like the look of this year’s car. It’s going to be difficult to look as big and as fast as they look now, because they are the fastest ever,” Sainz said.

“At the moment what I’ve seen, they are not the most beautiful ones, but they are not bad.

“It’s not like they are 2014, a really bad looking car.”

Additional reporting by Julianne Cerasoli.