Carlos Sainz reveals scans to check for any porpoising damage on body

Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz has said that he has had precautionary scans to make sure he is not injuring his body from the bouncing the new iteration of F1 cars cause.

The Spaniard has had a tough season so far with him unable to stitch together a real run of form, thanks to either a few errors, reliability issues, or just sheer bad luck.

There’s no doubting that he is a classy driver but it’s just not worked for him so far in 2022, and the bouncing he has suffered in his Ferrari hasn’t exactly helped things, with him already admitting he’s taken more time to get used to the new car compared to team-mate Charles Leclerc.

Indeed, so prominent has the bouncing been that the Spaniard has decided to get some precautionary scans done as part of his physio work, to ensure that there is no internal damage being done by the issue:

“I’ve had a few extra physiotherapy sessions with Rupert [Manwaring], my trainer,” said Sainz.

“[I’ve had] a few extra scans to try and see what is going on, to see if there is anything to be monitoring or to take extra care on.

“We have also done some extra mobility sessions because this [the bouncing] makes you tighter, less flexible, having less mobility so you put in more of that to compensate.

“So you’re having to do some compensation for these cars in your training and in the way you manage your days and your training plan, which I find is, actually, a challenge as an athlete but it is part of the process.”

The FIA’s technical directive should help ease the impact of bouncing but it remains to be seen which teams suffer because of that as it may well compromise car set-up.

The performance v safety argument isn’t something new in Formula 1, though, and safety, these days, will always win in the