Active Aero & Overtaking

For over a decade, overtaking was helped by DRS — a flap that opened in the rear wing on straights to shed drag and add speed, usable only when within one second of the car ahead. The modern rules go much further with active aerodynamics: the wings themselves change shape to suit the moment.

Two modes, front and rear

• A low-drag mode flattens the front and rear wings on the straights for maximum speed.
• A high-downforce mode steepens them again for braking and cornering grip.
• The car switches between the two automatically as it moves from straight to corner.

The leap from DRS is in two directions at once. DRS moved only the rear wing; active aero moves the front as well, so the car keeps its aerodynamic balance when it trims for the straight rather than going nose-heavy. And where DRS could only be used in marked zones when chasing, the new system flattens the wings for *everyone* on the straights as a matter of course — it is a normal part of every lap, not just an overtaking tool.

There is a hard safety rule beneath all of it: the wings must snap back to their high-downforce shape the instant the driver brakes or lifts, so the car can never arrive at a corner stuck in low-downforce, low-grip mode. The principle is unchanged from the DRS era: give the following car a temporary edge so overtaking is *possible*, without making it automatic. A pass still has to be earned.