Following the show of force of Max Verstappen and Red Bull at Spa, Ferrari took a hit on the head but must recognize it: its rival was much stronger this weekend on the side of Belgium.
Mattia Binotto, the director of the ‘Rossa’, has thus recognized the superiority of the Austrian team and explains that the Scuderia is already largely focused on its single-seater for the 2023 season.
“I think we didn’t have the pace and speed of the Red Bulls, who were almost all weekend, like they were almost in Hungary with a high downforce package,” Binotto said.
« Red Bull have been faster for several races, and we need to keep working on performance and development, not just for this season, but for the next one as well. »
« It’s a very strong team and very strong competitors. That said, we have to look at our data to understand the degradation. It was not only a question of efficiency and power, it is also related to the tires. »
« There’s a lot to study and a lot to improve on, and that’s the way we normally do things. We know they’re strong but we’ll try to do our best for the next races. »
The Italian now hopes Ferrari will be more dashing at Zandvoort next week.
« They were in their own league here, but it will be a different weekend and a different type of circuit there. We will analyze the data from this weekend, we think the gap will be smaller than what we think. hey what here. »
« We will try to aim for victory, it’s important. It will be one of the races before the end of the season where we will try to do great things on our side. »
Russell threatened Sainz’s podium
If Ferrari showed a big delay on Red Bull this weekend, it also saw Mercedes F1 getting dangerously close in the race. And if Carlos Sainz finally resisted George Russell for the gain of the third place, Binotto affirms that the Scuderia must do better to counter the progress of its German rival.
“It was due to the degradation of the tires which is part of the performance of the race. We know that Mercedes have come back strong in recent races, they still finish behind, but you have to take them into account for the next races. «
« But it doesn’t matter if it’s Red Bull or Mercedes, we have to focus on ourselves, try to understand where we weren’t fast enough, and look to make better developments. »
We saw the Ferrari drivers talking a lot with their engineers on the radio during the race, which was sometimes disturbing for them as Sainz pointed out at one point.
The Italian team have been guilty of a number of strategic blunders of late, but Binotto says the radio messages from Spa were not intended to hold drivers more accountable.
« It’s not really to give them more autonomy, but to ensure that there is transparent communication and a good understanding. At this time of the season, it is important to sometimes be clearer at radio, and they’re more involved. »
« There is certainly always the need to improve, and there are lessons that make us think. But looking at the season, a lot of outside perceptions do not necessarily correspond to reality, we sometimes took actions that were considered errors when they were not. »
Stopping Leclerc to set the fastest lap was the ‘right decision’
During the penultimate lap of the Grand Prix, Charles Leclerc returned to the pits to put on the tenders and try to steal the fastest lap from Max Verstappen. But that was ultimately not possible after he started just behind Fernando Alonso.
And if the Monegasque managed to get rid of the Alpine F1 during the last loop, he finally received a 5-second penalty for speeding in the pits (for 1 km / h), which sent him behind the Spaniard in the standings, in sixth place.
Binotto thus recognizes that the bet to stop Leclerc was risky but that it was the right choice. He also explains that a sensor problem, following the tear-off entered in the brake scoop at the start of the race, would have contributed to this incident.
“We made the right decision. You have to be brave to get the maximum. We knew it was going to be very tight with Fernando and we would have to overtake him. But it was the right choice, we didn’t get the fastest lap and we will have to analyze the reason. »
Regarding excessive speed in the pit lane, “we weren’t using our usual sensors to control speed as these stopped working following the Max tear-off incident, our systems may not have been accurate enough. I think that’s a pretty unlucky situation overall. »
