they adjust wings, tire pressure, gear ratios or change points, etc This year the set of gears is fixed over the entire year (there's some wiggle room the deta

they adjust wings, tire pressure, gear ratios or change points, etc This year the set of gears is fixed over the entire year (there's some wiggle room the details of which I forget, but that's the gist). A team has to elect at the beginning of the season what gearings they'll put into the gearbox. The tradeoff for this was that this year they've got 8-speed gearboxes compared to last year's 7. So in the past they had to pick 7 gears optimal for one track, now they've got 8 gears that must compromise across the whole season.