Spa-Francorchamps was a runaway down for Ferrari and the circuit in the Ardennes seemed tailor-made for the most efficient racing car in the field, Red Bull. But already in Zandvoort a week later Ferrari recovered some of the gap. Charles Leclerc would have been on pole there without making a mistake. Another week later, the Monegasque driver put in one of his usual perfect laps in qualifying and took pole position ahead of Max Verstappen.
He couldn’t have chosen a better time. Ironically, in Ferrari’s super fast Monza circuit, Charles starts ahead of everyone. “We didn’t expect after Spa to be able to start from pole position here,” said a beaming Charles Leclerc. “We surprised ourselves. Of course you can always do a bit more. But I was really happy with my last lap. I got everything together.”
Charles Leclerc took pole with a gap of 0.145s to his first pursuer and if Carlos Sainz had caught a slipstream in Q3 in the final, the second red car would probably have been faster than the Red Bull RB18 of the Dutchman: “My outlap was a bit chaotic. I was hoping that Lando could pull me. But that didn’`t work.” In the end it was the Spaniard who dragged the McLaren behind him. Lando Norris, in turn, gave Charles Leclerc a slipstream.
This time things turned around. Not Red Bull was faster on the straights, but Ferrari. The Italian engineers trimmed their car for top speed, while the championship leaders opted for a slightly larger rear wing. This is at the expense of top speed, but brings more contact pressure in the eleven corners. As a result, Red Bull was faster in the corners. However, too much time was lost on the straights. Red Bull calculated three to four tenths to Ferrari.
Low wings plus the most powerful engine: that’s what brought Ferrari to the top, according to German automobile magazine ‘Auto Motor und Sport’. The power unit from Maranello has the most power, although the differences between the manufacturers are small. It is said that Ferrari are able to use three to four kilowatts more than the Honda power unit. That’s four to five hp. Ferrari is said to have an advantage of five kilowatts to Mercedes, that would be seven horsepower. And Renault is also fully involved with its Power Unit.
Red Bull’s engineers decided on the chosen setup direction with the race in mind. They knew that Max Verstappen would fall back a few places anyway because of the engine penalty. In theory, the fifth engine of the season cost him five grid positions. “My lap was decent. But we were too slow in the first sector. The first chicane and the straight up to turn three cost us,” explains Verstappen.
Due to the larger wing, the DRS effect is slightly larger. On top of that, Red Bull hopes that Verstappen will be able to conserve the tires better with more grip in the rear. Red Bull therefore bet over the race distance on less wear and tear than the competition. “The long runs on Friday felt very good,” said Verstappen. But his competitor isn’t too worried.
Ferrari is back on course
After the second Monza pole, Charles Leclerc also feels on course for his second victory at the Autodromo. “I had a good feeling in the car on Friday. Our race pace should be strong.” Ferrari used practice and experimented a lot so that Spa didn’t repeat itself at the home race in Monza. “Carlos and I tested different things. We worked in the right direction with that and improved our pace.”
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In Monza too, the ground high rules makes it necessary to raise the car to prevent the floor from bouncing too much. At Mercedes, the increased ground clearance has meant that downforce is reduced and drag is increased. Which means the F1-75 falls out of the window again. Ferrari drew the right conclusions from the Spa debacle and this time the F1-75 returned to its comfort zone. “Of course, the rear breaks out in one place or another. But the car is predictable with this level of downforce,” says Charles Leclerc.
The problem that the tires overheated too quickly in long runs, as in Spa and Zandvoort, did not happen to Ferrari in the practice sessions. Here, too, things are better than last time. Maybe the track characteristics will help because Monza doesn’t put too much stress on the tires. The rear tires are in fact the ones challenged the most. The fact that they are relatively more stressed was recently the case in Austria and Canada. Two circuits where Ferrari was well positioned.
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