Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd
Formula 2 and FIA Formula 3 drivers will have the opportunity to spend more time using the drag reduction system at Monza this weekend.
The circuit’s second DRS zone, which is situated on the pit straight, has been significantly extended as the activation point has been moved from being 115 metres after the finish line in 2023 to just 12m after the finish line for 2024.
Drivers will have to be careful when overtaking though since track limits will be enforced down that straight. That does not just apply to the grass on the left-hand side, but also the gap between the painted white line running along the straight on the right-hand side and the pit wall.
The asphalt continues between the line and wall, but is technically considered outside of track limits and would lead to laptimes being deleted should drivers use that stretch rather than stay within the white lines.
AIX Racing’s Joshua Duerksen anticipates “more overtaking opportunities” with the lengthened DRS zone, and wider impacts of higher entry speeds approaching turn one on the fully resurfaced circuit.
“[Drivers] would be able to arrive with more, speeds having bigger chances to make an overtake,” he explained to media including Formula Scout. “I think this will create more chaos, more overtakes, more drama, but of course we are drivers, we like it. It’s going to be interesting and [I am] excited to see how much of an effect this will do.”
At the turns one/two chicane, the bollards on the left of turn two have been replaced with a 2.5-metre wide gravel strip.
The della Roggia chicane two corners later has also had a gravel strip of the same size installed, but one metre away from the track limits.
A change to the regulations for F2 and FIA F3 is that “non-liquid cooling agents which use latent heat of evaporation, such as dry-ice are forbidden”, while “non-liquid cooling agents within external devices which are attached to the car for cooling purposes only when it is stationary are permissible”.
There was previously more freedom surrounding their usage, but in 2024 there has been multiple instances in Formula 1’s support series (some leading to fines and penalties) of dry-ice pellets coming out of cars when they were on track.