Ideas
The acceleration off traction corners are where the AI had all the advantages
You ain't gonna reach higher top speed than them at the end of the straight if you're already late on the throttle, and had lower rate of early acceleration due to not being able to use ERS because of low traction (and tire temp is worsening that).
The floor scraping the ground is a thing, but it barely happens because of how flat the tracks are in game
Australia final corner is a good example, still manageable for player, but very tough
And because the dirty air is stronger this year, it became even harder to stick to the AI's back to take advantage of the slipstream
AI do affected by dirty air too, but they seem to manage it much better
It is one of the reasons why the AI seems to be able to overtake player so easily even though you have DRS like them, they were taking full advantage of your slipstream because they are literally kissing your rear wing already at corner exit, whilst never needed to worry about battery
The dev is really not looking at where the root problem is
I don't know how much it takes to train the AI on how they use ERS, but simply making them having to be more conservative with the battery would already solve like 70% of the straightline speed issue
The other 30% is for tracks where tire temp is a major issue for player, AI needed to be affected more by that too