How To Use ERS in F1 Manager 22 – Complete ERS Guide

If you’ve watched Formula 1 or played any of the F1 games such as F1 22, you’ll be aware of how ERS roughly works. However, both F1 22 and F1 Manager 22 handle ERS deployment differently. This can make it a little confusing when jumping into F1 Manager 22.

But don’t worry, in this guide, I’m going to run through exactly how ERS works in F1 Manager 22. I’ll show you how to set the best ERS mode for a variety of situations, how to deploy ERS correctly, and how to get out of an ERS deficit.

F1 Manager 22 ERS Explained

ERS in F1 Manager 22 is controlled during a race, quali or practice session from the driver information hub in the bottom left and right corners of the screen. As you can see here, I’m looking at Lando Norris, and managing his ERS usage.

Within this screen, there are a few things you should look out for.

The first few things you should really pay attention to are the top figures.

You will see on the left there is a blue bar which represents how much ERS you have deployed per lap. Then there is a yellow bar to the right of that which shows how much ERS you have harvested per lap. Then, in the centre of these two bars is an overall percentage. This shows your overall percentage of how full your battery is.

This will read 100% when you have a completely full battery and will go down as you deploy more ERS. If the bar hits zero, it means your driver has run out of ERS, and will no longer be able to deploy ERS until some has been harvested.

Underneath these bars are the ERS strategy modes that you can deploy for each driver.

F1 Manager 22 ERS Video Guide

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ERS Strategies

There are five different ERS strategies that you can deploy in F1 Manager 22. Each strategy will either harvest or burn a different amount of energy. And each of the deployment modes will allow your driver to deploy ERS in a different way each lap.

• Overtake – Burns 2 MJ per lap
• Defend – Burns 2 MJ per lap
• Deploy – Burns 2 MJ per lap
• Neutral – No MJ per lap
• Harvest – Stores 1 MJ per lap

You’ll be able to see next to each strategy how much faster or slower your driver will be with each mode enabled. This is represented by the green or red arrows.

Next to these arrows are the amounts of energy that will be stored or burned each lap with each particular mode enabled. Now, this isn’t overly clear and is a question I get asked a lot. To be fair, it confused me when I first jumped into F1 Manager 22.

Overtake and defend

Essentially, overtake and defend will increase your lap times.

Deploy

The deploy mode will increase your lap times even more and should be used in qualifying and when trying to put in some hot laps during a race.

Neutral

The neutral mode is the setting you should probably use the most during a race, as this will keep your ERS relatively balanced.

Harvest

Then harvest will recoup some energy during a lap by deploying less than you harvest.

Whats the difference between overtake, defend and deploy

One of the biggest questions I get asked is what is the difference in overtake, defend and deploy modes. After all they all use the same amount of ERS each lap so how do they differ?

This is a great question and one that can be confusing at the start. But the difference is in how your driver uses the ERS throughout a lap.

With the overtake and defend ERS modes, your driver will tactically use ERS to attack or defend in spots around the lap which are good overtaking spots. They will dump a lot of ERS in one go to maximise their speed down a long straight for example.

The deploy mode is the fastest, and will have your driver using the full 4MJ of ERS per lap at different points around a lap. They will use it in a more balanced manner as they exit different corners throughout a lap.

This is the best deployment mode to be in when trying to set the fastest lap of the race, or during a qualifying lap.

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How ERS in F1 Manager 22 works

OK, so with the basics covered, let’s jump into a real scenario and see how ERS actually works in F1 Manager 22, as it isn’t quite as simple as I just made out.

So to start with, I’m going to go back to the blue and yellow bars at the top of the ERS screen. These are the two most important areas to keep an eye on when managing ERS.

ERS deployment limit

The left blue bar is your deployment bar. Each car can deploy up to 4MJ of ERS every lap. Once you have deployed 4MJ in a single lap you will no longer be able to deploy any more ERS until you cross the start line and this bar resets.

That is the case even if you have ERS left in your battery. This is a limit enforced for every car to avoid drivers deploying too much ERS every lap.

ERS harvest limit

The yellow bar on the right-hand side is your harvesting bar. This shows how much ERS you have recovered during a single lap. ERS is recovered during the braking zones by converting braking energy into ERS. You’ll notice this bar going up as your driver brakes into each corner.

Much like the deployment, you have a limit on how much ERS you can recover each lap, and this is capped at 2MJ per lap. Once you’ve recovered 2MJ of energy, you stop harvesting for the remainder of the lap.

Once you cross the start/finish line to start another lap, both of these bars reset down to zero, and you can start deploying and harvesting again.

Deployment vs harvesting

There is a big problem here which you may have noticed already. And that is that you can deploy 4MJ or ERS per lap, but can only recover 2MJ.

Just a quick note, even when you have a high ERS mode set such as overtake, you will still harvest energy during the braking zones.

This means that if you set a high deployment mode such as overtake or defend you will be deploying 4MJ of ERS, but only recovering 2MJ. This gives you a deficit of -2MJ per lap. This is indicated on the right-hand side of each command.

But, if you set the ERS command to harvest, why does it only say that we’ll recover 1MJ per lap when we can harvest up to 2MJ each lap? This is because when you set the ERS to harvest, your driver will still use some ERS during a lap.

The amount that is used will be around 1MJ per lap, allowing you to recover around 1MJ of additional ERS each lap on average.

It is very handy to stay on board for a few laps with your driver while having the ERS strategy menu open so you can watch the blue and yellow bars go up and down.

You’ll quickly notice that you harvest the maximum 2MJ of ERS pretty quickly around a lap. But if you have a full deployment mode active, you will be able to use ERS for the majority of the lap before you reach the 4MJ deployment limit.

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ERS Situations and examples

So now we’ve got a pretty good understanding of how ERS works in F1 Manager 22, let’s take a look at a few examples of ERS usage during a race.

Trying to overtake or defend

When trying to overtake or defend against other drivers, it’s useful to use either overtake or defend ERS modes. These will allow your driver to deploy ERS in different parts around the lap.

You won’t be able to use these modes for too long though as you will start to deplete your battery pretty quickly.

It is ideal to have a relatively full battery before trying to overtake or defend. If you have a full battery, you will have roughly 2 laps of full deployment available before you completely run out.

You can manage the ERS commands through different parts of a lap. If you’re racing around Monaco for example, you can change the ERS mode to neutral through the first sector to keep your battery pretty level.

Then, as you approach the tunnel and the Nouvelle chicane which is one of the only overtaking spots on the track, you can enable overtake mode. It is always advisable to enable overtake mode a few corners before the overtaking spot to allow your driver to close the gap and get ready for an overtake attempt.

Once you are either passed the car in front or the overtaking opportunity is over, you can drop the ERS back down to neutral.

Remember, that if you do leave your driver on overtake or defend, or even full deploy and you do accidentally run out of ERS. You’ll have to spend a few laps with the harvest mode enabled to replenish your battery stores.

Running out of ERS

And that brings us on to what to do if you run out of ERS. It’s an issue that we’ve all probably had at some point. Either we’ve forgotten to take a driver out of deploy mode and accidentally drained our battery, or have left overtake on too long trying to pass a car in front.

But when this happens you’re going to be in an ERS deficit, and you’ll need to know how to get out of it.

Now, the first thing you’ll need to do is to change your ERS deployment mode to harvest. This will start to replenish your battery each lap. But it won’t go up anywhere near as fast as it depletes.

As I mentioned above, when you are using an aggressive ERS mode, you will get roughly 2 laps of full deployment before your battery drains from 100% to 0%.

But when you’re harvesting, you can only regain half the amount that you can expend. Going back to the blue and yellow bars, you can deploy up to 4MJ per lap but only harvest up to 2MJ.

But the issue is that even when you are in harvest mode, your driver will still be using some ERS around the lap, around 1MJ worth. This means that even when harvesting you’ll only gain on average 1MJ of battery per lap.

With this in mind, it means that it will take roughly 4 whole laps with the ERS set to harvest to fully replenish your battery.

If you have a car behind you and you’re at risk of being overtaken, 4 laps with little ERS assistance can be dangerous. So it’s a very good idea to ensure that you don’t run your battery down to empty.

Try and keep some ERS in the tank, and try to use the harvest ERS mode during moments where you are less at risk of losing positions.

Start of the race

Moving on to some other scenarios where ERS deployment is important, and the first one that comes to mind is the start of a race.

This is easily your best opportunity during a race to gain some positions. So I would always advise that you change both of your driver’s ERS modes to overtake, as well as increasing their pace and fuel usage commands.

This will ensure your drivers are on full attack mode for the first half a lap of the race and give them the best chance of moving up the grid. This can be configured before the race starts in the strategy screen. And I’d recommend getting into the habit of doing this when choosing your driver’s strategy.

After around half a lap or once your drivers settle into a rhythm, I’d highly recommend lowering some of the pace, fuel and ERS commands. This will allow your drivers to settle into their race strategy and avoids you burning too much ERS, fuel or tyres too early in the race.

Pit in-lap or out-lap

Other than the race start, the next best part of the race to gain positions is during the pit sequences. Pitting earlier or later and either undercutting or overcutting drivers around you can help you gain positions without having to overtake them on track.

And you can use your ERS to help with this. I would recommend trying to ensure you have a relatively full battery as you approach your pit window.

This will allow you to use the ERS deploy mode to put in an extremely fast lap either on your way in or way out of the pits.

If a driver in front or behind you pits a lap before you, use the deploy mode to put in a fast lap on your in-lap to potentially beat them after you’ve made your pitstop.

Or if you pit earlier than cars around you, you can deploy ERS on your out lap to undercut them. This can be extremely powerful as overtaking on track can be hard in F1 Manager 22, especially if you’re stuck in a DRS train of cars.

Safety cars and VSC

One part of a race which can really help you recover your battery stores is during a safety car. If a safety car or VSC is deployed, you can only drive to a certain pace. This makes using high deployment modes or fast pace modes a little bit irrelevant.

As soon as a safety car is deployed, turn down your driver’s ERS mode to harvest. There is no benefit at this point in deploying excess ERS.

These moments can be invaluable during a race, as they allow you to reset your ERS over a couple of laps, as well as helping you recoup some excess fuel and preserve your tyres for a few laps.

Safety cars can be big game changers for this exact reason, and they can really mix up a race. So try to be on the ball and use them to your advantage where you can.

But remember, as a safety car enters the pits and the race resumes, ensure you turn your pace, fuel and ERS modes back up. A safety car restart can give you the opportunity to attack cars ahead of you, so it may be worth using some ERS overtake during a restart.

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Overview

Hopefully, this guide has been extremely helpful and has helped explain ERS in F1 Manager 22 a little bit. It can be very confusing with the green and red arrows along with the -2MJ, 0 and +1MJ indicators.

I don’t think the interface does an overly good job of explaining ERS to those who are unfamiliar with how it works. But hopefully, that is where this guide steps in.

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