Felipe Massa believes that in their attempt to return to the head of the Formula 1 field, former team Ferrari has committed “too many blunders.”
The Scuderia’s current driver lineup, Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz, received praise from the 2008 World Championship runner-up, who claimed that the pair “complete each other” within the squad.
Massa believes that the company needs to reclaim the “coldness” in its decision-making that brought about prior success for the team, which hasn’t won a Drivers’ title since 2007 and a Constructors’ title since 2008. This is because of the increased scrutiny that comes with being a Ferrari driver.
Although the speed gap to Honda and Mercedes is believed to have decreased in recent weeks, Massa believes that the power unit has been a significant contributor to the team’s underperformance in the previous two seasons.
The squad needs to restore its cutthroat streak to succeed, the 11-time race winner continued.
In an interview with the Italian newspaper Libero Quotidiano, the Brazilian explained why Ferrari has struggled in recent years: “So many reasons, too many blunders.” “In Ferrari, you endure a lot of pressure from the media and fan devotion.
“Maranello is a racing team that requires sound judgment. We had [Stefano] Domenicali, [Jean] Todt, Ross Brawn, and Rory Byrne in our Ferrari.
“Charles is quick, and Sainz works well with the team; Leclerc and Sainz complement one another. The engine, which has less horsepower than Mercedes and Honda, is the source of the issue rather than the drivers.
Regarding the Drivers’ Championship battle this season, Massa stated that he would like to see Max Verstappen win his first championship, giving him the chance to defeat “one of the greatest in history” in Lewis Hamilton.
The former Ferrari driver remarked, “I would hope Max, even though Mercedes and Hamilton are expanding.
“The German cars are coming up to the Red Bulls in terms of performance after leading the field at the start of the season. Hamilton has closed the gap that existed before a few general practitioners.
“Verstappen is quick, fearless, and makes the most of the car, but occasionally he goes too far.
“Hamilton is incredibly talented. He is wise. He also has the experience that could help him win his eighth championship.
“Sports history reveals that the reign of the expert champion is continuously threatened by a talent. Max has a style I admire. Although the Dutch lad has a chance to defeat one of history’s finest, Hamilton remains the king and deserves the eighth title.
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Mattia Binotto, the head of Ferrari’s Formula 1 team, claims that he would rather face the challenge of rectifying an unreliable but competitive package than the reverse.
Charles Leclerc’s stunning engine failure while leading the race and Carlos Sainz’s unconnected hydraulic problem caused a double retirement for the Italian squad in the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.
In Barcelona, Leclerc also experienced a power unit failure, and Maranello client teams Haas and Alfa Romeo have also experienced difficulties.
After spending a significant amount of time and money upgrading the power unit over the winter in an effort to catch up to Red Bull and Mercedes, who set the pace last year, Binotto said he wasn’t surprised the team has seen some reliability issues.
I’m not shocked, undoubtedly worried, and in some ways disappointed, he declared. “Because I believe we should try to solve it, but we haven’t done so yet.
“However, I am unable to hold the squad accountable because I am aware of the effort they have made to improve upon prior performances. I am aware that the road ahead is lengthy, and we lacked enthusiasm at the beginning of the season.
“As I stated, this is a path that we are currently doing, and right now another step is still necessary. I believe that we will continue to work hard and remain a team. While we are aware that the work is not yet complete, we have demonstrated our ability to perform it properly thus far.
“I would much rather have good performance and work on dependability than the other way around.”
Binotto acknowledged that the team’s main concern is that the root reasons of the continuous power unit dependability problems have not yet been identified.
It is worrying, he said. “I don’t know the solution, and I would like to know what the issue was right now, so that makes it much more of a concern.
It’s still very early in the season, but the only other thing is that we will have to install another new engine. Your problems might not always be easily fixed.
“Since whatever has happened is basically a short-term cure, I’m not sure what approach we’ll need to take, whether it be lower mileage, a different type of usage, or a short-term fix.
“So something that I believe we’ll understand in the next days, and maybe by the time we’re in Canada, we’ll have a clearer answer.”
Binotto played dismissed the idea that the squad had to win in Montreal the next weekend in order to restart its title defense.
“I don’t believe that it is at all necessary to win. Race by race, we’ll be paying attention, and on weekends, we’ll attempt to maximize our potential. There was undoubtedly something wrong today, and we need to look at all the facts, not just the reliability.
But when returning to the workplace, I believe that, as per usual, the lesson should be to attempt to comprehend, move forward, and try to accomplish it as soon as possible, while also ensuring that everything we are doing is strengthening the product.
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Laurent Mekies, a Ferrari engineer, has stated that the team’s development of the 2021 car is now almost complete, with focus focused totally on the new age of F1 when it dawns in 2022. However, he adds that this does not imply they have stopped working on the SF21’s shortcomings.
This season, the million-dollar issue is: When should teams start thinking about next year’s car, when the significant set of rule changes take effect? However, other teams, like Ferrari, have had to balance development on this year’s car with that of next year’s machine. For Haas, the solution was to focus immediately on next year’s rules at the expense of this season.
Mekies, a Ferrari Racing Director and Head of Track Area, explained that the Scuderia has made the switch and is not continuing to develop this year’s car at Paul Ricard in front of this weekend’s French Grand Prix.
“From an automotive development standpoint, we have already taken our selections,” he declared. There won’t be a significant upgrade to address these issues [on the SF21] until 2022 at the earliest.
The Frenchman clarified that Ferrari will continue to work on understanding the problems with the SF21 even though they are not evolving it in the conventional sense of frequently producing new parts.
But you can always work on [the problems] by simply understanding them better, and if you understand them better an either because you correlate them better or you simply understand what are the reasons why we are performing a little less in those circumstances an it can open the door to solutions that you can already apply.
And because of this, coming here after a few races in which we experienced a lot of slow-speed bends is still a nice test for us. We want to assess how we improved and whether we gained any new knowledge. And this is the strategy we’re using to fight this weekend.
In the standings heading into the French Grand Prix, Ferrari is only two points ahead of McLaren, but their drivers are anticipating a return to “reality” following surprise pole positions for Charles Leclerc in Monaco and Baku, as well as a podium finish for Carlos Sainz in the Principality.
Why is Ferrari operating so slowly?
Ferrari’s primary problem is that they have drastically lost straight-line speed. How come that? They were by far the fastest team on the straights toward the end of the 2019 season, therefore their current problems may be traced back to that.
Given Ferrari’s advantage – particularly in qualifying – over Mercedes and Red Bull, who both pondered how they had stolen such a march, Lewis Hamilton famously referred to Ferrari’s engine as having a “jet mode.” The FIA periodically inspected the Ferrari engine and was satisfied with its legality, but at the October US GP, a clarification of the rules regarding fuel flow was made in response to inquiries from Red Bull.
A few hours later, Ferrari’s streak of six straight pole positions came to an end. The team hasn’t been the fastest in qualifying since, despite their insistence that the regulation change had no impact on them.
Sebastian Vettel and Charles Leclerc discuss the challenging Spa race, in which the Ferrari drivers competed for position outside of the points.
The Scuderia now clearly has the worst power unit in F1 as evidenced by Leclerc, who won the pole in Belgium in 2019 but finished 13th in 2020, traveling 10 km/h slower through the speed trap in qualifying this year. There have been other engine rule changes for 2020 that appear to have affected the Scuderia more than others. Ferrari was the only team to maintain its lap time at Spa from 2019.
The drama off the track followed the setback on it. The FIA and Ferrari struck a secret settlement concerning their engine earlier this year, which was not well received by competing teams and raised suspicion. Ferrari adamantly maintains their innocence while refusing to provide any information.
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.
Reasons For Which Ferrari Can’t Keep Up With Mercedes In Formula One
Although both are true automotive powerhouses, Mercedes is undoubtedly miles ahead of Ferrari in Formula 1. Let’s look at some of the causes.
Mercedes has dominated nearly every weekend of the 2019 Formula One World Championship season and (as of the conclusion of the Canadian GP) has not lost a single race. In the Hybrid era, Ferrari, which has historically been a direct rival of Mercedes, was predicted to maintain their competitive status, but eventually fell short of expectations.
As of this writing, Mercedes is more than 1.5 times as far ahead as Ferrari in the Constructor’s championship with 338 total points. Additionally, Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes is only 11 points behind Scuderia Ferrari in the Constructor’s Championship in the Driver’s Championship. All of this is incredibly terrible news for Ferrari, which prompts the question: How did it get to this point? Here are 10 reasons why Ferrari can’t compete with Mercedes in the Formula One season of 2018.
Why did Ferrari’s power decline?
A grid penalty later on in the year is anticipated as a result of Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari engine failure during the Spanish Grand Prix, which irreparably damaged the turbocharger and MGU-H.
When he ran out of power early in his second stint of the Barcelona race, Leclerc was in the lead.
Max Verstappen won, costing him the championship lead. Ferrari also lost ground to Red Bull in the constructors’ standings as a result of his retirement.
Ferrari claims that neither of the two damaged components nor any other parts of the power unit had a design flaw or reliability problem that led to the breakdown.
That suggests a problem with the installation or operation, although Ferrari is keeping quiet about the precise root of the issue.
At the Miami Grand Prix, Leclerc switched to his second power unit of the year, indicating that he will at the very least need to convert to a third MGU-H and turbo.
Unless Ferrari decides a whole new set of components is worthwhile, it is likely that it may keep using the combustion engine, which seems to be unharmed.
With 16 races left and his first power unit having run four full grand prix weekends, it is all but certain Leclerc will need to employ a fourth MGU-H and turbo, at least later in the season. Ferrari has not yet revealed its strategy for Monaco.