Naturally, the last thing that teams want is for their rivals to have a chance to draw detailed conclusions about their car early on, so they will often put screens up when a driver returns to the pits to conceal the story that the paint reveals.
Sticking with the aerodynamics theme, teams may add aero rakes to the car. These scaffolding-like metal structures are covered with sensors and can help confirm that the real-life performance of the car matches up with what they found in their wind tunnel simulations.
Similar to the flow-vis paint, aero rakes provide valuable data about airflow, giving the teams an additional opportunity to see exactly where turbulent air could be impacting their performance.
What do teams want to find out during pre-season testing?
The restrictions that have been in place since unlimited testing was banned in 2009 mean that the short trip to Bahrain will be the first measure of true performance that hasn’t been simulated. As sophisticated as teams’ software is, driving in a non-virtual environment will inevitably throw up surprises.
They’ll mainly be focusing on aerodynamics, the effectiveness and reliability of parts they worked on over the winter break, and how their drivers handle the car. There are also chances for the mechanics to practise their high-pressure pit stops, so no element of a traditional race weekend is forgotten.
On top of that, they will also be provided with the latest Pirelli tyres that will be on offer at each round on the calendar. Especially for the young rookies, this will be a great chance to get a feel for a critical component that can dramatically alter the course of a race.
