The weekend ends with a sad seventh position Singapore for Carlos Sainz. The Spanish driver, after the mistake made in qualifying, had to face a comeback race, as did his teammate. Despite the points won, the regret for Sainz and Ferrari is deep, especially given the very competitive race pace.
Singapore: Another crash-filled weekend for Sainz
Carlos Sainz is not used to accidents. In fact, especially in the last two years, the Spaniard has proven to be a solid driver, capable of great performances in terms of speed and good reading of the race. In fact, it was with such a head that Sainz managed to grab the only non-Red Bull victory of 2023 in Singapore. Today, however, the script was completely different. Carlos Sainz was coming from a good race in Baku, which ended disastrously with the accident that occurred after contact with Sergio Perez on the last lap. Many points were lost on the Azerbaijani circuit, with Singapore that should have represented an opportunity for revenge, given that Sainz has not been on the podium since the Austrian GP.
Instead, even the Saturday Singaporean ended with an accident, relegating Sainz to tenth position. Starting in the middle of the group, the Spaniard had to be very careful not to get into other accidents. Perhaps, also for this reason, he was surprised at the start first by the bold move of Colapinto and then, still during the first lap, also by the Red Bull of Perez. The 55 of the Ferrari But he didn't just sit back and watch. Thanks to an early pit stop, Sainz managed to climb from second-to-last to seventh, after a really long second stint on hard tyres and after completing several overtaking moves on his rivals.
Sainz already looking ahead: "let's see how the car goes in Austin"
A race that, in context, turned out to be quite good. In terms of strategies, Ferrari did everything right. Furthermore, both Leclerc and Sainz gave it their all, making no mistakes unlike qualifying. The Spaniard was particularly keen to see the remarkable race pace on the hard tyres of the car, which in some parts of the race was among the fastest on the track. A fact that leaves even more room for the pungent regret that has gripped the Prancing Horse's insiders since yesterday. Among them, of course, is also Carlos Sainz.Race pace has never been our concern. It was more of a dry qualifying lap than with this car the window we have is really small to make the tire work, as we saw with Charles yesterday. We have paid for this weakness at times this year. We will try to do better in the last six races to start further ahead”.
Sainz, who is very eager to leave the last two race weekends behind him, is already looking to Austin. In fact, Ferrari, like the other teams, will have the opportunity to study each other well in these weeks of break that precede the Texan race. Bringing updates for the occasion could be fundamental in order to be even more competitive in the final part of the season.What we need to see is how does this car work on normal tracks like Austin, which has much faster curves. We had to get more points on the track, regarding the constructors. Who knows, maybe we get to Austin and Mexico and the car is still fast and we can get some more good results.".
