Scuderia Ferrari Spanish driver Carlos Sainz has revealed to overcoming “more obstacles than I was expecting” after fighting his way back to score a podium finish at the end of a chaotic 2021 Russian Grand Prix.
The Spanish driver burst into the lead after a great overtaking move on Lando Norris and seemed in a commanding position with strong pace in the opening stage of the event at Sochi. However, graining issues affected his race pace in the end of the first stint.
As a result, Ferrari decided on an early pit stop which threatened to drop Carlos Sainz outside of the top five in the final part of the race due to tyre wear, but when heavy rain fell in the final five laps, the Maranello team timed its switch to intermediate tyres to perfection to score a podium finish behind Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton and Red Bull’s Max Verstappen.
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“At one point in the race, it really looked like it was going wrong” – Carlos Sainz admitted – “After suffering so much graining on the medium tyre, after leading the race quite comfortably for the first seven or eight laps and facing so much degradation and losing the position to Lando, then being one of the first ones to pit and being in the queue behind Valtteri [Bottas] and suffering from all that traffic, at some point I really didn’t think the podium was happening. But I found myself P3 in front of [Sergio] Perez 10 laps to the end and I said now is a good opportunity to keep this position. I had good pace on the hard, I had a good feeling. But then suddenly I saw the rain coming.” – he explained.
“It was starting to rain in turn five and turn seven and all of us out there on hards were struggling massively to keep the car on track while people on mediums looked to have a bit more grip with the softer tyre, managing to keep the car on track whilst I was nowhere. I was at some point considering changing to the soft tyre just to make it to the end and in the end, we decided to go for interest for the last four laps and it worked out beautifully and we ended up third. Good calls, good management, just a bit more obstacles I was expecting after leading into turn two.” – Scuderia Ferrari Spanish driver Carlos Sainz concluded.
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