Ferrari, more trouble ahead
For Ferrari and its 2023 customer teams, this 2023 Formula One season seems to be truly a difficult year. In fact, bad luck has a hand in it even in those (few) moments when things seem to turn in the right direction. In the last race in Melbourne, while the Maranello team had to collect a very disappointing double zero in terms of points, marked by regrets and controversies – Haas had managed to snatch six important points in the standings thanks to the seventh place scored by Nico Hulkenberg.
The German veteran, who returned full-time to Formula 1 this year after spending three seasons as a ‘reserve’, collected Haas’ first top-10 finish of the season, taking the American team to seventh place in the team standings.
MGU-K broken, Hulkenberg escapes damage
Now, however, a bitter surprise has arrived for the team led by Gunther Steiner. On the VF-23 car of Nico Hulkenberg, the MGU-K seems to have broken. The news was revealed by the German site Auto Motor und Sport, which underlined how Hulkenberg was lucky to be able to cross the finish line, avoiding having to stop a few kilometers from the checkered flag. “I lost power for a brief moment – the German driver at the end of the GP – the gears were no longer synchronized. Then the power came back and I was told to park the car right after the finish.”
At this point, the reason for the former Aston Martin third driver not returning directly to parc ferme after the checkered flag is clear.
Poor reliability
Naturally, this new issue alarmed not only Haas, but the entire fleet of Ferrari-powered cars, including the parent company and Alfa Romeo. In fact, reliability is proving to be a serious problem for all six of these single-seaters. In addition to Charles Leclerc’s retirement in Bahrain and the subsequent grid penalty suffered in Saudi Arabia for battery replacement, ahead of the most important stage of the Melbourne weekend, Haas and Alfa Romeo had to replace the internal combustion engine. Ferrari racing director Laurent Mekies, explaining this choice, had spoken of a conservative decision. The MGU-K is a component that had already created problems for the Maranello team in 2022: Haas alone had in fact suffered problems with this element on four occasions.
The (bad) memories of Baku
It would be essential for Ferrari to avoid reliability problems of any kind in the next races. Between accidents and troubles linked in various ways to the power unit, the Prancing Horse team is in fact the second to have completed the fewest laps in the race at the start of the 2023 Formula 1 season; only Williams did worse. The next race, scheduled for the end of April, will also take place on the very fast track in Baku, where one year ago both Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz were forced to retire due to power unit technical failures.
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