No one would have expected such a disappointing Ferrari given the conditions of last season in which both Ferrari drivers achieved at least one victory each and numerous podiums. This year the fight had to move to the lower positions of the podium, due to a decidedly over-performing Red Bull but also an under-performing group, such as Ferrari, Mercedes. Carlos Sainz, unlike Leclerc, who achieved two, is still looking for his first podium of the season.
But while outside the paddock there continues to be talk of transfer rumors and friction within the Ferrari garage between Sainz, Leclerc and Vasseur, inside there is talk of a much bigger problem, that is, of a Red team that is too inconsistent and which according to Sainz experiences too many ups and downs. On the occasion of the weekend of Spa, which precedes the summer break, Carlos Sainz focused on Ferrari's critical points and failed promises in this first hot phase of the season.
A complicated start
“It was a frustrating start when we realized that Red Bull were way ahead of us and that it would be difficult to fight with them. We expected [our] car to be more competitive – says Sainz. In fact, there have been few occasions in which we have seen a beautiful SF-23. A single-seater born under Binotto's management, difficult to understand - and no it's not a play on words with the former team principal and his famous phrases but the pure truth underlined by the drivers and by those who continued to work on it to make it at least manageable . One of the main concerns concerns the behavior of the car which varies from track to track, without a clear point of reference. In Austria the SF-23 was as competitive as expected, but in Hungary the situation went worse than expected. There is therefore no single truth about the single-seater.
"Now we have so many ups and downs, where one weekend you can fight for third position, while in another you fight for eighth position. This swing in terms of performance can mean that maybe sometimes we are a tenth ahead or a tenth behind in a compact grid, which isn't much, but in Ferrari the sensations are different when you return with a third or eighth position.".
Lots of work to do in the second half of the season
It is precisely from the second half of the season that things usually start to get complicated for Ferrari. We also saw it last season, when Red Bull secured its dominance in the face of a stranded Ferrari. Obviously, Sainz hopes that things in this case will change for the better. Ferrari is fourth in the Constructors' World Championship, also followed by McLaren two positions down compared to last year. At a time when Mercedes and McLaren are on the rise, and when Aston Martin seems to be in difficulty, Ferrari must make the most of it.
“This is the challenge we are in at the moment, there will be weekends where we will have to fight for fifth and sixth position, where we will have to celebrate having done the best we can. We need to focus on maximizing the car's potential in the second half of the season if we want to get as many points as possible for the constructors' championship. There are teams, such as McLaren and Mercedes, who have made important progress. In Canada and Austria we seemed to be the best performers, but recently we had two difficult weekends where it seemed like we didn't make any progress. Now maybe we have a few good races and it will seem the opposite. I think it goes in cycles and we need to average over the season to understand the situation well."
Sainz promotes the Ferrari structure
Despite the rumors and the media pressure especially from the Spanish media; despite the problems and general discontent, the Spaniard defends the Red and hopes to be able to compete for the top positions again.“At Ferrari the ideas are clear, we are pushing hard to improve. Clearly it's difficult to do this during the season, especially in the budget cap era, you can't change everything. But we have found a direction, in the factory in the simulator we are developing the car trying to improve what didn't work this year. I'm confident that it will get better, but I'm sure that the others will also take a step forward next year, so the focus remains on ourselves."
On the question Mekies, now former Ferrari sporting director Sainz expressed himself like this: "Obviously Laurent has been an important part of Ferrari in recent years and has given his contribution to the team. I had a good relationship with him. In general, he had good skills, I think that's also why he will become Team Principal of another team, because he did a good job with us. But the transition period has already been completed, also in helping Diego [Ioverno] to re-immerse himself in his old work”.
Source statements: Motorsport.com
