MPH: Mark Hughes on...

Roll on the first tests of the pukka 2009 Formula 1 cars. That's when we get to find out if the established order has been shaken up.

For the past decade, each team's designs have evolved year on year. Making a competitive car has been all about finding a fruitful direction and following it, constantly making an improvement in one area, then going round the whole car and optimising it all over again. It's called refinement engineering in the road-car industry. The radical changes to the aerodynamics for 2009 break that cycle completely, and in theory how well a team has developed its car this year should have little or no benefit next year. The last major shake-up was the grooved-tyres/narrow-track regulations introduced for 1998. Since that time regulation changes to wings, underbodies etc have been relatively minor tweaks and have not rendered all previous development obsolete. Even a change in engine formula, from 3-litre V10s to 2.4-litre V8s, had little effect on the technical philosophies of the cars. Instead, the tyre war of 2001-06 drove most of the changes.

For example, the great longitudinal strength of Michelin's construction encouraged Renault to take full advantage by making their cars ever-more rearwards-biased, allowing them to convert that tyre quality into traction and get more out of the tyre than conventional cars. There was a trade-off - it meant a slightly less aerodynamically efficient car than the best of the more conventional designs, as the aero distribution had to match up to the weight distribution - but by 2005 and 2006 it seemed Renault had hit upon the best compromise.

Just as the characteristics of a tyre drove the main variation in form during that period, so the standard Bridgestone control tyres from 2007 took Renault out of the equation. Ferrari had always been on Bridgestones so were unaffected, while McLaren's technical philosophy was much less 'out on a limb' than Renault's and they were therefore less vulnerable.

It had also invested a lot more in tyre modelling, something that finally paid off big time. This was all that was behind the ebbs and flows of competitiveness at the front of the field. The teams behind stayed behind, always a year or more off the front, developing as fast as the leading teams when actually they needed to be developing faster.

So many options for 2009

That's all over for now, in theory. So different are the 2009 aero regs that they represent ground zero. Sure, those teams with the best resource and talent are still ultimately going to make the fastest cars. But now no-one has to overcome their deficit before they can even begin to compete, and even those best equipped might initially go down a less fruitful path than lesser teams, just because the spread of options is so massively wide. It just might throw up a new competitive order.

If it does, it will in the process result in a new perception of the driver hierarchy. It will inevitably be a flawed perception, just as the current one is. The technical characteristics of a car and how it dovetails with a driver's natural driving style overwhelmingly dominate a driver's performance, something that is still massively under-appreciated.

Giancarlo Fisichella still cops the blame for Renault's fall from title-winning grace in 2006 to also-ran in 2007, for instance. 'Look where they dropped to in Alonso's absence,' say people whose understanding really should be a lot deeper. Granted, Fernando's calibre of performance is higher than Giancarlo's, but by a tiny fraction compared to the differences in car performances resulting from the technical factors I mentioned.

Yes, Kimi Raikkonen underperformed in 2008 - but for very real reasons to do with the characteristics of the Ferrari F2008. There's every likelihood that next year's cars will be more oversteery in balance than 2008's - and Kimi should therefore bounce right back. When he does, take with a pinch of salt any comments you hear about 'Kimi's rediscovered motivation'.

Then there's the weight and bulk of the KERS hybrid systems and how they impact upon weight distribution. "That is going to be one of the absolute keys in 2009," says Williams technical director Sam Michael. "We have no way of knowing in advance with any certainty what the ideal weight distribution for the new slick tyres is going to be.

"But because of the weight of KERS and the design lead times, we're pretty much committed to our weight distribution well before we understand how the slicks will respond. So if you've happened to hit on the right answer you'll have a great season. Equally if you've hit on the wrong one, you could have a terrible year."

Then there's the matter of how the weight and size of the KERS impacts upon the heavier drivers, something we've touched on before, bearing in mind that KERS will take up a lot of weight that would otherwise be used for ballast. At Red Bull, that could play into the hands of Sebastian Vettel (1.76 metres/62kg) against Mark Webber (1.85m/75kg).

Let's look forward to the changes in the established order. But let's not read too much into them.