Ferrari Explains Key Reason for 2025 Car Overhaul Despite 2026 Reset

Saajan Jogia | Feb 22, 2025

Ferrari SF-25 / Ferrari Press Image

The Ferrari F1 team has revealed the real reason behind the extensive overhaul of its 2025 title contender, despite the big 2026 regulation changes.

With teams needing to balance development between their 2025 and 2026 cars, the conventional approach was to refine the 2024 designs. However, Ferrari took a different route, making substantial modifications to its car, so much so that technical director Loic Serra described it as 99 per cent new compared to its predecessor.

F1 on SI reported that Ferrari boss Fred Vasseur indicated the initial upgrades on the SF-25 could be the final major developments before the team transitions its focus to the 2026 challenger. While he has not outlined a specific timeline, his comments suggest that Ferrari will assess the impact of early-season updates before determining the right moment to fully commit to next year’s car.

After falling just 14 points short of McLaren in the Constructors' Championship, Ferrari has introduced major upgrades, including a redesigned suspension and revised geometry. Aware that 2025 presents a major opportunity to secure the title before next year’s regulation overhaul resets the competitive order, it is likely that the team is making an aggressive push to maximize its chances.

While that could be one reason for a revamped car, Ferrari's technical director Loic Serra has explained that the SF-24 F1 car reached a technical limitation, and it was not possible to extract more performance. While he made it clear that the new car is based on a similar concept, the internals have been upgraded to meet the performance demands. Speaking to Automoto.it, he said:

“The main objective of the SF-25 is to find space to be able to push in aerodynamic development, but in general in what will be the updates that will arrive during the season. The SF-24 finished very strong, but it was now impossible to find any more margin to find performance.

"Adjustments were made to the front area which was moved slightly forward, but we are talking about small details. That is not the main change.

“Even though it has changed a lot, the car is a perfect continuity of its predecessor . In fact, we have mainly changed the internal components. But the concept of performance is the same. We hope that it is the margin of development, as you anticipated before, that will give us that extra boost compared to last year . But we do not expect to put the car in a different situation than the current one”.

He added:

"In general, the approach, as I said before, is to find margin to improve development and pace. All this had become impossible with the SF-24. We wanted, to put it better, to try to make sense by optimising what we already had."

Serra, who took over his role in October last year, said that the new internal components are designed to make the most amount of difference. He said:

“With the technical regulations in their final year, it’s all about the details in these cars. We’ve focused on the front suspension, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Most of the car is new, and you might not necessarily notice it from the outside, but those parts have the biggest impact. If you look at last year’s grid, the car in front of us was about 30 milliseconds quicker.

"With that in mind, every single millisecond we can find on the aerodynamic side, the suspension side or the tyre management side, in the end, really counts."