Cars
Ferrari’s Technological Innovations Part 6: 1968 - The First Wing in a Formula 1 GP. Competitors Followed.
Ferrari pioneered the rear wing in Formula 1, debuting at the 1968 Belgian GP. Inspired by engineer Michael May's early concept, Ferrari’s innovation increased cornering speed, influencing all teams and prompting crucial regulations for safety.
It took 57 years for someone to understand that an inverted wing, placed high on a race car, would generate downforce that improves tire grip on the ground, ensuring much higher cornering speeds. In 1956, at the Nürburgring circuit in Germany, a Porsche client-driver, an engineer as well as a gentleman driver, showed up at the 1000-kilometer test with his small Porsche 550 equipped with a large wing. Curiosity and irony from other drivers and even Porsche itself soon vanished: Michael May, his name, set the fastest lap with a huge lead over the others. Immediate objections were raised in the name of safety, with Porsche itself getting involved, resulting in the car with the wing being disqualified.
And that was it. Looking back, it’s surprising that no one considered the fast lap time and the potential of the idea. The wing reappeared five years later in a Ferrari 246 SP test. These were the years in which Maranello had applied spoilers to their winning cars in the sport and GT categories (click here to learn more https://roarington.com/media-house/stories/ferraris-technological-innovations-part-5-1961-discovering-air-as-an-ally), but the results weren’t convincing, so the wing was soon abandoned.
