Belgium Setups F1 2020

F1 2020 setup guide overview – Belgium

Spa in F1 2020 is one of the funnest tracks in the game. It has been a classic since it was first introduced in 1985, and has held some of the most exiting F1 races in history. Spa-Francorchamps also boasts one of the most famous two corner combinations in the world, with the legendary Eau Rouge / Raidillon section of track.

Due to the extremely long track, finding the perfect F1 2020 Belgium setup is tricky. Spa combines extremely long flat out sectors which require minimum drag, and over 20 corners. Some of these corners are taken at extremely slow speeds and require a lot of downforce to maximise performance. This calls for one of the most finely balanced F1 2020 car setups to maintain maximum performance throughout every lap. A combination of straight line speed, downforce and balance is the key to a good Spa setup.

Due to the extremely long sectors at both the beginning and end of a lap of Spa, we would recommend running your aero in a low-drag setup. Setup your rear downforce higher than the front to ensure the rear of the car stays planted through the long sweeping corners throughout the lap. This low aero setup should give you just enough downforce throughout the slower parts of the lap, while ensuring you aren’t sacrificing straight line speed.

Spa isn’t too hard on your tyres, and you shouldn’t suffer too much from tyre wear throughout the lap. There are also a lot of corners which you will be accelerating from a medium speed. This means we can set our on-throttle differential higher. There shouldn’t be too many parts of the lap where you suffer from excess wheel spin, other than possibly the final chicane. Having you on-throttle diff higher will give you maximum performance when you accelerate.

You can also keep your off-throttle differential reasonably high as well. This will ensure both rear tyres are rotating evenly throughout the corners, keeping the car more finely balanced.

The quickest suspension geometry setup is to run minimum camber and minimum toe. This will give the best one lap performance, but will hurt your tyres across a race distance so isn’t normally recommended. Spa is a circuit which doesn’t suffere from too much tyre wear so we can run a car setup that isn’t too far from this.

Having a lower camber setup around Spa will allow you to run faster through each corner. The lower toe setup will mean you will have the fastest straight line speed possible.

Spa is an old circuit. This comes with a fairly bumpy track and a lot of height changes throughout the lap. You will also be riding the kerbs a lot to maximise your mid corner speed. All of this leads to one thing, and that is a soft suspension setup. Having a soft setup will help keep your car stable throughout all of the bumps and over the kerbs.

A lot of the corners around Spa feature quick direction changes and long mid to high speed corners. This means you will need a responsive and balanced car. Set your anti-roll bars to be fairly stiff to ensure your car remains responsive throughout the lap. Combine this with a low ride height to ensure you don’t have any excess drag.

With this many long straights, and low downforce, you will want to ensure your car has a lot of stopping power. Run an extremely high brake pressure setup to ensure you can slow the car down from high speed efficiently. You shouldn’t worry too much about locking your front tyres.

Just to ensure you don’t suffer from front wheel locking with this much brake pressure, you should look to run your brake bias pretty close to 50:50. If you are attempting an overtake, you can push it up towards 60:40, but be careful as this much brake pressure through the front tyres could lead to a locked wheel. Not what you want when attempting a big overtake.

Just to ensure we don’t suffer from excess tyre wear from the aggressive camber and toe setup, we will lower the tyre pressures a little. It’ll also help with traction coming out of a few of the slower corners.

How To Best Drive The Belgium Grand Prix Circuit

Belgium is a fanatastic circuit to drive, with 20 corners, many of which are taken at mid to high speed. You need to attack the track confidently and learn which corners you can really attack the apex at.

If you are trailing another driver around Spa, there are plenty of overtaking opportunities. You can have a lot of fun attacking other racers around Spa, as there isn’t a set few places to overtake, so the driver in front really needs to be on toes the whole lap.

Some of the best overtaking spots are at the end of the long straights. Turns 1, 7 and 19 are among the best overtaking spots, as they are all slow corners with plenty of track to run 2 or 3 cars wide. But you can also surprise the racer in front by pulling an overtake at turns 10 and 13. These are great spots as they are slower corners and the driver in front wouldn’t necessarily expect an overtake move. Just ensure you allow for plenty of room on the track in case the driver in front needs track to run off in to.

If you want to make a brave overtake move, you should look to adjust your brake bias forward to maximise stopping distance. You can push this up to around 58-60, but just be cautious of locking your front wheel. You may need to ease off the brake earlier through the braking zone to avoid a lock up.

If you are suffering from excess wheel spin coming out the final chicane, then you can manually lower your on-throttle diff. There is a long straight section before this final chicane, giving you plenty of time to adjust your on-throttle diff setup. We would recommend keeping it low through the turn 1 hairpin as well, then raising in back up on the run down to Eau Rouge.