As part of the €80 million investment that launched the Belgian Grand Prix, the circuit has undergone some major modifications, such as the legendary Eau Rouge corner, as well as other parts, to improve safety.
Due to the fame of that corner in Formula 1, the circuit decided not to alter its character despite the works, even the founder of the Dromo track design company, Jarno Zaffelli , said that the challenge of Eau Rouge has not disappeared even if the protections have been modified.
In addition, he considers that the resurfacing in key areas, especially in the Eau Rouge-Raidillon section, makes the track faster than before, so the new generation 2022 cars might not be too far from the speed of the last season.
Speaking about how the drivers would find the revamped Spa-Francorchamps, Zaffelli said: “It will be a flat corner and it will offer opportunities, the cars will feel the difference between the new tarmac and the old one.”
“If you look at the GT cars during the Spa 24 Hours, pole position was 1.7 seconds quicker than the year before,” he continued. “We know that this year the Formula 1 cars are somewhat slower than in 2021, so there will not be a big difference.
The increased speed is a result of Dromo using a much more modern material for the asphalt, as much of Spa was done decades ago: “The last time the track was asphalted was about 20 years ago.”
“Since then, the performance of racing cars and bikes has increased a lot, the technology to make asphalt materials and paving equipment has changed dramatically,” Zaffelli said.
“Dromo’s experience and knowledge are actually the development of the design for each specific circuit”, commented the manager of the company who worked with 20 different concepts before deciding on the final version of Spa.
“In the design and subsequent developments, we took into account the new regulations and the tyres. We had just over 20 chances at Eau Rouge, we spent several days with professional drivers in our simulators to get their feedback,” he revealed.
“Afterwards, we spent two full days with professional drivers at the Vi-Grade simulation center, supervised by Thierry Boutsen and Emanuele Pirro. Between October and November 2021, the work was fine-tuned on the F1 and GT car simulators with Marco Bonanomi to provide us with your comments,” he said. “This work helped us a lot in choosing the final design.”
“Later, it was submitted to the FIA Circuits Commission before the works were carried out in the first months of 2022. In addition, we had our internal analysis of the circuit, a LIDAR scan of the area and a complete analysis for finalize all the details,” concluded Zaffelli.
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