Ferrari gave it a shot, with a perfect Formula 1 race executed by both drivers. In the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz defied performance predictions, keeping pace with McLaren for much of the race. However, Ferrari needed a win. The course of the entire race weekend confirmed once again how unfavorable the 5.281-kilometre Yas Marina Circuit on Yas Island is to the Italian team. The Maranello squad must channel the disappointment of drivers, engineers, and mechanics into a sort of motivational springboard to bounce back stronger in the 2025 Formula 1 season.
McLaren is the constructors’ world champion. An unrelenting pace on the Hard tire allowed Lando Norris to make the difference over Carlos Sainz and secure the ninth title for the British team. The Englishman won the final race of the season thanks to a strong second half of the race, enabling the Woking-based team to capitalize on their efforts throughout the F1 season. After the events of the first stint, the situation became clear: whoever won the race would deliver the constructors’ title to their team. For Ferrari, however, a second-place finish from Charles Leclerc was also necessary.
The Monegasque driver delivered an excellent first part of the race, finishing fourth after starting from the last spot on the grid. The Monegasque’s pace was six-tenths slower than the leading duo due to traffic. He executed a remarkable comeback, closing in on George Russell, who slowed him down in the last two laps of his stint. Charles Leclerc gained ground on the straights, but George Russell pulled away in the technical sections, never allowing DRS or an overtaking opportunity. Carlos Sainz was in second place and had a pace comparable to Lando Norris.
The Spaniard, after the virtual safety car, stabilized his gap to the winner at around 3-4 seconds until the end of the stint. Based on the telemetry analysis of the data related to tire degradation, we can notice the fact that the performance drop-off for both drivers was very similar. The most critical sector for the Spaniard was the third, where he lost about two-tenths. As in the qualifying session, the most challenging turn for the SF-24 was Turn 9, where Lando Norris was more effective in all phases: entry, mid-corner, and exit. Moreover, the Ferrari driver was very aggressive on the brakes between Turns 12 and 15, favoring entry over exit. This choice, overall, was not beneficial.
Consequently, the Spanish driver was slower in the short straight leading to the final turn and lost more time than he gained under braking, namely about half a tenth. Mercedes also had a strong first part of the race, diversifying strategies to help Lewis Hamilton recover from the back of the pack. The future Ferrari driver completed over 30 laps on the Hard tires, improving his references as the car became lighter. The seven-time Formula 1 world champion ended the first stint with a pace similar to his teammate, who started on the yellow-banded Pirelli tires.
George Russell experienced accelerated tire wear in the final part of the stint, forcing his team to pit earlier than planned. Both Brackley cars benefited from excellent straight-line speed thanks to their low-drag aerodynamic setup. However, this configuration did not provide good traction. The W15 slid significantly on corner exits, and the drivers could not be aggressive on the throttle without exacerbating tire wear further.
Charles Leclerc was the first of the leading drivers to pit and switch to Hard tires. The plan defined by the pit wall for the Monegasque was Plan C, which involved completing over 30 laps in the second stint. To extend the life of his tires, the Monegasque driver adopted a very slow initial phase in the early laps. Thanks to this approach, he was able to improve his lap times until the end of the race, achieving the highest lap time improvement among the top drivers. The Ferrari driver had to defend against the approaching Mercedes from behind, managing tire wear particularly between laps 40 and 44.
Therefore, at the pit wall’s request, Charles Leclerc increased his pace during those laps to lower tire temperatures before pushing again. At the front, Lando Norris secured the victory with an average pace two-tenths better than Carlos Sainz’s SF-24 on the Hard tires. Looking at the degradation info based on data collected from the second stint, the Spaniard matched the Englishman’s pace for only five laps. Lando Norris once again showcased the MCL38’s advancements in terms of tire management, setting his best times in the final part of the stint when Carlos Sainz faced the most difficulties.
From a telemetry perspective, the third sector proved to be the most challenging once again. Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz were faster than Lando Norris in the first two-thirds of the track due to the setup chosen by the Italian team compared to McLaren. Ferrari leveraged the straights in the first two sectors to match Lando Norris’s performance, recovering what was lost in traction at Turns 5 and 7 and cornering at Turn 1. The final sector, however, favored the MCL38, which, thanks to greater aerodynamic downforce, was faster at Turn 9 and more effective in traction, sliding less due to vertical load.
Ferrari likely opted for a lower-downforce setup to facilitate position recovery after qualifying. This choice paid off with Charles Leclerc, who easily gained positions, but disadvantaged Carlos Sainz, who had a strong qualifying. On Medium tires, Lewis Hamilton was the fastest on track. The seven-time Formula 1 world champion finished the race in fourth place, lapping nearly nine-tenths faster than his Mercedes teammate in the second stint of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. In terms of tire management, the two drivers experienced opposite performance degradation.
George Russell struggled to bring his tires up to temperature, suffering from graining early in the stint, which compromised the final part of his race. Lewis Hamilton, on the other hand, improved his lap times as the stint progressed, partly due to a shorter stint. The Briton maximized tire performance in traction, exiting Turns 5 and 7, to close the gap to his teammate. Ferrari came close, but the comeback in the final races was not enough to close the gap to McLaren. The Maranello technicians and engineers should have addressed this earlier, during the middle of the Formula 1 championship, where they squandered many opportunities with subpar performances following the introduction of an aerodynamic update package at the Circuit de Catalunya in Barcelona.
Even the Woking team lost a significant number of points along the way, but ultimately, Andrea Stella‘s team left 14 fewer points on the table than Frederic Vasseur’s. It’s worth noting, however, that the Frenchman put his mark on a Ferrari car a year later than his counterpart at McLaren. Only in 2024 did Frederic Vasseur shape his Ferrari, bringing it within just a few points of the championship this year. The SF-24 single-seater was a very competitive car after the summer break, laying a solid foundation for the 2025 Formula 1 season.
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