In Formula 1, Ferrari once again paid the price for imperfect tire management. Another missed opportunity, as the Prancing Horse had the pace in qualifying to take pole position. Undoubtedly, the experience gained yesterday will be quite useful today in the second qualifying session of the Texas weekend, which counts for the Sunday race. Here, Ferrari will be able to fine-tune the car to optimize the performance of the soft tires and perhaps demonstrate that the SF-24 in Austin could have achieved more than a 3rd and 5th place.
Let’s now analyze the telemetry comparison between Max Verstappen and George Russell’s impressive lap with his Mercedes, which seemed to struggle during FP1 to understand the substantial updates brought to Texas. We saw the two Silver Arrows frequently go off-track, especially in the snake section of S1 (from turn 2 to turn 10) and in the penultimate corner (turn 19). Among the changes made during the 3 hours between FP1 and the Sprint Shootout, the setup was slightly altered by raising the ride height for more stability.
Mercedes’ strength was evident in all sectors, both with Russell and Hamilton, who, without the yellow flag caused by Franco Colapinto in the second sector, probably would have taken pole position. In fact, the Briton had gained over 0.350s on Russell just in S1, where he had the best performance of the day. Russell, on the other hand, built his time in the second sector, where the W15 struggled more compared to the top 3 teams. In S3, his time was nearly identical to that of Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, with just 0.002s separating them.
As for Red Bull, onboard analysis of Max Verstappen shows how the engineers found a perfect balance between the front and rear axles, especially in the most challenging corners of the circuit. We are referring to the “esses” in the first sector, which are tackled at an average speed of 250 km/h, as well as the sweeping corners in the last sector. Thanks to the resurfacing of the track, the cars can run lower and stiffer, no longer having to absorb the excessive bumps seen in past years, especially in the first sector.
Stiffer suspension and a lower center of gravity allow the floor to work better in this F1 era, as roll in the corners is reduced, resulting in more stable handling through high-speed turns. All of this seems to favor the Milton Keynes team, which in Texas yesterday, highlighted the characteristics of its car on circuits where stiffer suspensions are beneficial.
As a result, Max Verstappen was able to create a good margin (0.244s) in the first sector (turns 1-7), characterized by several direction changes, all tackled at over 230 km/h. In this section, the RB20’s minimum cornering speeds were consistently higher: +4 km/h in turn 3, +17 km/h in turn 4, and +3 km/h in turn 6. Moreover, looking at the throttle usage graph, we can see how Max’s car was much more responsive in the direction changes, allowing him to stay on the throttle more aggressively than the Briton.
The two tenths lost in S1 were recovered in the second sector, characterized by the long straight from turn 11 to turn 12. In this section alone, thanks to the Mercedes power unit delivering +4 km/h on the straight, Russell gained 0.120s and was able to maintain this speed longer by braking slightly later, without delaying the throttle application out of turn 12, where it’s easy to run wide if the braking point is missed. In the third and final sector, the behavior of both cars was very similar, as both generated plenty of downforce in the sequence of corners from 16 to 20.
The updates brought by Ferrari to the three Grands Prix preceding the autumn break seem to be working very well from FP1 onward. It also appears that the decision made by Diego Tondi and his team to delay further modifications on the Italian cars was not a hasty choice. The new floor introduced by the Maranello-based team at Monza is paying off, successfully eliminating the bouncing phenomenon that has been much discussed. This is the technical summary of Ferrari’s first Friday.
However, Ferrari wasn’t able to optimize the package, making changes between the first free practice session and qualifying that may have slightly unbalanced the car. At the beginning of Q1, during his cool-down lap, Charles Leclerc asked for +4 clicks to the front. On this track, having a strong front end is crucial for setting up the many direction changes that make up the first sector. This adjustment seems to have slightly unloaded the rear, which suddenly gave way on the Monegasque driver’s final attempt in Q3 during the approach to turn 4.
From there to turn 10, Charles Leclerc lost a full 0.400 seconds to Max Verstappen. This is the difficulty of this sequence of corners: if you miss one direction change, the disadvantage carries through to the first braking point: 6 corners. It’s a real shame because the telemetry analysis shows that without that error, Charles Leclerc would have been in contention for pole position, regaining what he lost in the last two sectors. In the fast sweeping corners, in fact, the SF-24 proved to be extremely stable, providing the necessary downforce to stay on the throttle for as long as possible.
Looking at Lando Norris’ telemetry, we can see that his McLaren was also a strong contender for pole position until turn 16. In the setup for the long sweeping curve that includes turns 16-17-18, the Briton in the MCL38 had to lift slightly and downshift. The reason is simple: without this move, he would not have been able to take the proper line to tackle the corner at full throttle. The speed and delta charts show exactly how much Lando Norris lost in this part of the track.
A gap that he was unable to make up in the last two corners, where McLaren had struggled from the start of the day and where Piastri went off the track in Q1. In conclusion, we can certainly say that today’s battle for pole position for Sunday’s race will be more open than ever, with four teams and seven drivers potentially fighting for the top spot, including the two Ferrari cars. It will be far from straightforward, and all the data and telemetry will need to be thoroughly analyzed to fine-tune the F1 cars’ setups as much as possible.
— see video above —
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