Carlos Sainz Still Among the Top
A week after the first encouraging signs in Singapore at the Marina Bay street circuit, which would eventually lead to his second career victory, Scuderia Ferrari Spanish driver Carlos Sainz got off to a good start in Japan, although he didn’t record the fastest laps. In both Friday practice sessions, Red Bull took the spotlight with Max Verstappen, but the Spanish driver from the Maranello team still demonstrated a strong pace, initially setting the second fastest time in FP1 and then concluding the second session in fourth place, with his Maranello teammate Charles Leclerc taking his place in the rankings.
Close Competition, but Red Bull Leads
Overall, it was a positive day for the ‘Scuderia,’ even on a track that wasn’t among the favorites due to the characteristics of the SF-23 that don’t particularly suit a circuit like Suzuka. Carlos Sainz commented, “It seems that we are very close to our usual rivals, but we have returned to the scenario of a few races ago with a very strong Red Bull. With my engineers, we are fine-tuning the car’s setup, and today we tried various setup adjustments to find the right compromise on this circuit. There is a lot of data to analyze, and tonight, we will decide how to approach tomorrow, trying to get the car into the right performance window. We have a couple of very intense days ahead.”
Friday Testing
As highlighted by #55, Scuderia Ferrari made changes throughout the day, starting with those related to the car’s underfloor and various setup changes. He added, “I tried the new underfloor in FP2, while Charles did it in FP1, and it seems to work. In any case, it’s not a big step in terms of aerodynamics, but we still used our Friday to test this innovation. We made mechanical changes and employed various setups, and tomorrow we can put it all together to take another step. It’s nice to see that we are just behind Max’s Red Bull, but I believe the real qualifying battle will be with McLaren, and so far, we have done a good job. Although it’s difficult to understand these sessions simply because we made changes, our goal now is to put together everything we have tried to rely on the car I hope to have for this weekend.” – the Ferrari man concluded at the end of the second free practice session for the Japanese Grand Prix in Suzuka.
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