Hungary’s BUDAPEST — Ferrari provided two distinct justifications for their disappointing performance in Hungary on Sunday night. Charles Leclerc, the race driver, faulted the strategy, and Mattia Binotto, the team manager, blamed the car’s performance.
The messaging between the team manager and the driver was noticeably different, even though the two statements weren’t entirely unrelated. Leclerc thought the race could have been won. By crossing the finish line in sixth place, he had closed the 80-point gap between himself and Max Verstappen for the championship. Binotto declined.
In This Article...
The Ferrari is “not performing as expected.”
As he described the reasoning behind the Italian team’s choice to transfer Leclerc onto the hard tyre, team manager Mattia Binotto claimed that Ferrari’s car was “not working as intended” in the race.
When reflecting on Friday and today’s race, Binotto said, “I think it is important to say that we believe the car was not working as expected and we didn’t have the speed we were hoping to have.
So while the weather today was undoubtedly different and grew cooler, generally our speed was insufficient, and regardless of the tyres we were using, I don’t believe we performed as well as we had hoped.
“And without a doubt, it was the same with the hard; when we fitted the hard, our simulation indicated that it would be a challenging couple of warm-up laps; they would have been slower than the mediums for 10 or 11 laps, but they would have caught up by the end of the stint – and it was a 30-lap stint.
Because it was a 30-lap stint and we were hoping to hold onto Max’s position, we installed the hard tyres at the time. On the soft, it undoubtedly would have been too long. Yes, it would be challenging at the beginning of the stint, but it would get easier by the conclusion, according to our decision and analysis.
“Overall, the tires weren’t functional. I am aware that they did not perform well on other cars, but I believe that the analysis we conducted was supported by the data we had available. As I previously stated, the primary cause is not the approach but rather why the car did not perform as well as we had hoped for today. I
“It was the first race this year where the car wasn’t as competitive as we are generally hoping for, and it was the situation with Carlos as well because he was on exactly the same strategy as Lewis and started first but finished second, and Lewis went on to finish second.
“So the automobile wasn’t running good today. Additionally, a poorly performing car prevents the tyres, especially the hard ones, from performing as they should.
When asked if he thought he could win the race, Binotto responded, “I don’t think so. Today, speed and pace were really what we lacked.
We couldn’t have won today, in my opinion. And I’m not sure why, but it was the first race in the first 13 that we didn’t have the necessary pace to take the win.
“You need to first examine it performance-wise to understand, and I’m confident that once we understand that, we will understand why the tyres weren’t functioning properly.”
Christian Horner, the head of Red Bull, claims that his organization finds little solace in Ferrari’s continued reliability issues in Formula 1.
Ferrari has undoubtedly had the fastest car for the majority of the season, but due to strategy mistakes and a poor finishing percentage, it is trailing Red Bull in the championship standings.
Charles Leclerc’s engine issues prevented him from winning the Spanish and Azerbaijani Grands Prix, and the Maranello team experienced a stressful finish to the most recent Austrian GP.
At the Red Bull Ring, Carlos Sainz appeared to be headed for a 1-2 finish when his stunning engine failure forced him out, and his burning Ferrari brought out a virtual safety car.
Leclerc then encountered a perilous sprint to the finish line as he fought a throttle issue that was leaving his car underpowered in turns.
Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto revealed that he had to shut off and turn away from the TV displays for the final three laps, which perfectly encapsulated the anxiety that Ferrari experienced on the pitwall.
The engine failure for Sainz has shown how Ferrari is still far from solving the engine problems that have dogged it this season, even though Leclerc’s car held on for him to win a victory that keeps his title aspirations alive.
Although Ferrari is still concerned about technical issues, Red Bull asserts that it cannot just wait for its primary opponent to experience issues.
When asked if Red Bull found solace in their rival’s glaring flaw, Horner responded, “Not much. We don’t pay them a lot of attention.
“We have no control over or influence over that in any manner. I believe that we need to put our attention on ourselves and maximize our individual capabilities.
They might have easily placed first and second because they had a very good car in Austria.
Although Max Verstappen continues to comfortably dominate the championship standings, sitting 38 points ahead of Charles Leclerc and 57 points ahead of teammate Sergio Perez, Horner believes that any of them might win.
Absolutely, he responded. We have only reached halfway through the championship, and things are still very unpredictable.
“There is still a great distance to travel. Austria, in a way, served as damage control, as we were able to secure the pole position, win the sprint, and finish in second place. Max has only dropped five points to Charles in the drivers’ title, while the constructors’ championship has certainly seen relatively little harm.
How did Ferrari F1 fare?
Since F1 racing began, Scuderia Ferrari has been the most successful and well-known racing team, taking home more victories and championships than any other team. Everyone is wondering what happened to Ferrari F1 now that it is obvious that Ferrari is going through a dry spell.
The team Ferrari had some difficult seasons that resulted in the worst season and finish in forty years due to technical troubles, management concerns, CEO Louis Camilleri’s unexpected resignation, regulation constraints, engine rule changes, slower cars, and inconsistent performances from drivers.
Ferrari had not accomplished this feat since 1992 when it went without a victory for the second straight season in 2021. Since then, Ferrari has been attempting to overtake Red Bull and Mercedes as the two most successful racing teams in Formula One. Let’s investigate what occurred at Ferrari F1 and what is now going on.
Check out the great products from the official F1 store here if you’re looking for some F1 memorabilia.
What went wrong in F1 with Ferrari?
The Red Bull driver won today’s race after starting from 10th on the grid. After Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc switched to the hard tyre compound for the final stint, he passed the championship challenger twice.
According to Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto, the team’s lack of performance during the race jeopardized their chances of winning regardless of their chosen strategy. In response to Verstappen’s second pit stop, Leclerc said they erred by pulling him into the pits too soon and fitted the hard tyres.
Verstappen claimed that the secret to his success today was “choosing the right tyres at the right time.”
“Of course, we know that our vehicle is quick overall, but I think Ferrari was also quite quick throughout the race; they simply made the wrong decision with the hard tyre,” he said. Therefore, there are still a lot of areas we may look into and improve upon.
Verstappen claimed that the team can still make progress despite winning from 10th on the grid at a track where overtaking is notoriously challenging.
On a circuit like this, winning the race after starting in the bottom ten is obviously very, very excellent. “However, there are a lot of things we’ll examine to see what we could have done differently.
Always, there are a few things we could have done better. Overall though, I’m obviously really pleased with today.
Verstappen stated that Red Bull must continue to improve their vehicle in order to be competitive when the championship starts at Spa-Francorchamps following the summer break.
We simply keep working and attempting to make the automobile better since, in my opinion, there are still a few places where we can improve. It will be fascinating to see how competitive we’ll be in those races after the break since they’re a little different from those on this circuit.
What went wrong for Ferrari?
Ferrari unintentionally installed a set of brand-new soft tires on Leclerc’s car during his first run in the final round of qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix.
Prior to handing him a fresh set of the red-walled compound for the last Q3 efforts, the team had planned to send him out on used softs for the first run.
Over the radio, Leclerc enquired about the tire call, to which the team responded, “Sorry, that was a mistake. After deciding against doing another run, he finished the session in fourth place overall, over eight tenths of a second slower than Max Verstappen’s best time.
After qualifying, Leclerc remarked, “I assume there was a miscommunication, it wasn’t a big deal. “But certainly I brought it up because I was a little taken aback.
After serving a power unit penalty, Leclerc will start the race from position 16 on the grid, one position behind title contender Verstappen who will also experience a grid drop.
Verstappen finished nearly six tenths of a second ahead of the competition after skipping his final run in Q3, highlighting his dominance at Spa.
Red Bull, in Leclerc’s opinion, had been “very strong” throughout the Spa weekend, and its speed had come as “a surprise, since I guess we anticipated to cut the gap in qualifying a little bit more.”
It is a wide gap. I thus hope that it will change in Zandvoort. But before that, tomorrow’s race is coming up, and we appear to be a little more competitive. We’ll see how it turns out.
George Russell, a Mercedes driver, has picked Verstappen to come from 15th on the grid and win the race. Verstappen acknowledged that he would be disappointed if he could not make a comeback to place third.
If he maintains his pace from today, Leclerc added, “I will also be sad if I don’t get back on the podium, but since he’s with me, it’s going to be very difficult for me to go back on the podium.”
But we never know, right? We can regain the lead with a strong first stint and a clean race, I’m confident.
How did Ferrari perform in the most recent race?
On the 18th lap of the French Grand Prix on Sunday, Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari left the track and collided with the safety barriers, forcing him to withdraw while holding the lead.
Max Verstappen, the leader of the championship, raced to the front, ahead of Lewis Hamilton in a Mercedes, and Leclerc, who was unharmed in the collision, started from pole position.
The Monegasque, who won the last Grand Prix in Austria and started this race 38 points behind Verstappen, was on pace to repeat after dominating qualifying on Saturday.
However, Leclerc lost control of his Ferrari on the 18th loop of the Paul Ricard track at Le Castellet, spinning off and coming to a stop in the safety barriers at a low pace.
Similar to the throttle issue that prevented him from winning in Austria two weeks prior, this one seemed to be the cause of his failure.
When his condition was inquired about after the incident over the team radio, he yelled, “I cannot get off throttle.”
He let out a loud “Noooooo!” to express his annoyance, but he was still able to get out of the automobile without getting hurt.