Five technologies from Formula 1 that you use in your car today

Formula 1 is often described as the pinnacle of motorsport, a traveling circus of glamor and speed. But beneath the shiny surface, it is above all the fastest laboratory in the world. In search of hundredths of a second, engineers are pushing the boundaries of physics, thermodynamics and materials science.

Although 1,000 horsepower cars seem light years away from our city traffic, many of the technologies developed for the track are now standard equipment in the cars we drive, making them safer, more efficient and more exciting. This is the story of five key innovations that found their way from the racetrack to your garage.

1. Hybrid drive born from KERS

The Kinetic Energy Recovery System, better known as KERS, debuted in Formula 1 back in 2009. Its original purpose was purely performance – to collect the enormous energy released during braking, store it in a battery or flywheel and release it at the push of a button as a short-term burst of additional power for overtaking.

This system evolved into today’s sophisticated hybrid power units with the components MGU-K (which harvests kinetic energy) and MGU-H (which harvests thermal energy from the exhaust gases).

The principle of regenerative braking, perfected in F1, is the foundation of every hybrid and electric vehicle on the road today. From the Toyota Prius to modern mild-hybrids, every time you slow down, your car collects energy that would otherwise be wasted. An extreme example of this transfer is the Mercedes-AMG ONE, a road-going hypercar powered by an almost identical 1.6-liter V6 turbo-hybrid engine from Lewis Hamilton’s F1 car.

2. Changing gears at the touch of a finger

Until the end of the eighties, Formula 1 drivers in cramped cockpits had to hold the steering wheel with one hand and use the classic gear lever with the other. Then he is a legendary engineer John Barnard designed a semi-automatic transmission with levers located behind the steering wheel for Ferrari’s 640 for the 1989 season. This eliminated the need for the clutch pedal and removing the hand from the steering wheel, which enabled faster and more precise gear changes.

Although the system was initially unreliable, the concept was so superior that it was soon adopted by all teams. The technology arrived in road cars as early as 1997 with the Ferrari F355 F1 model. Today, so-called “caps” have become common, not only in sports cars, but also in family SUVs and sedans with automatic transmission.

3. Aerodynamics that ‘glue’ the car to the road

Airflow management is the key to speed in Formula 1. From the first wings in the 60s to today’s sophisticated drag reduction system (DRS), cars have become aerodynamic laboratories on wheels. The concepts developed in the teams’ wind tunnels directly influenced the design of the road cars.

The movable rear wings on supercars like the McLaren P1 or the Ferrari SF90 are a direct copy of DRS, adapting downforce to driving conditions. But the impact is also visible on everyday vehicles.

Diffusers under the rear bumper, which create a low pressure zone and “suck” the car towards the ground, improve stability at higher speeds. Even the so-called “air curtains”, the openings in the front bumpers of modern cars, are used to direct air around the wheels to reduce turbulence and improve efficiency, a technique that was perfected precisely in Formula 1.

4. Carbon fibers

In 1981, McLaren introduced the MP4/1 car and changed the rules of the game forever. It was the first car whose monocoque chassis was made entirely of carbon fiber. At the time, the material was considered too fragile for a load-bearing structure, but McLaren proved otherwise. Carbon fiber offered incredible strength and stiffness at a fraction of the mass of aluminum or steel, drastically increasing driver safety in crashes.

The first road car to use this technology was the legendary McLaren F1 from 1992. Today, carbon composites are used to make complete chassis (eg Alfa Romeo 4C), but also as structural elements or body panels on many premium vehicles to reduce overall weight and improve performance.

5. Steering wheel controls

At speeds in excess of 300 km/h, a Formula 1 driver cannot afford the luxury of taking his hands off the steering wheel to find a button on the dashboard. The concept of a multifunctional steering wheel was born out of this necessity. What started in the 70s with just a few basic switches has today evolved into complex control units with more than 25 buttons, switches and displays that control everything from brake balance to pit communication.

This “everything at your fingertips” philosophy has been directly translated into road cars. The cruise control, radio, phone and trip computer buttons that we take for granted today are a direct result of the evolution of the F1 cockpit. Ferrari even transferred its famous “Manettino”, a rotary switch for selecting the driving mode, directly from the steering wheel of Schumacher’s car to its road models.