McLaren with Lando Norris managed to get close to Mercedes and in qualifying even threatened the supremacy of Max Verstappen’s Red Bull, who took pole position in the Austrian GP by just 48 thousandths of a second.
It is indisputable to record the growth of the MCL35 M, the single-seater that this year has a Mercedes power unit thanks to which it has been able to make a further leap in quality. But the technical staff headed by James Key is insisting on aerodynamic developments, finding an efficiency that on fast tracks like Spielberg seems even better than that of the black arrow, with the same engine.
The team from Woking reached 141 points in the Constructors’ World Championship after the two Austrian races in a week, 19 points more than Ferrari: McLaren can rely on Lando Norris in fantastic form, while the Scuderia can count on the contribution of two drivers like Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz pushing themselves to make the most of the SF21, with Daniel Ricciardo in the second MCL35 M who only at times manages to be useful to the cause of the orange team.
The feeling is that McLaren, also counting on the technical updates that are brought at each race (a new floor made its debut at Spielberg with a series of flow deviators placed in two rows), can stretch on the Ferrari which, instead, has already frozen developments on the SF21, preferring to focus on the ground effect single-seater of the 2022 Formula 1 season.
“No, I don’t think this is the situation” – explained Matteo Binotto, Ferrari team principal – “We saw it in Austria, and a few GPs ago on other tracks, but the situation could change on other circuits. I think it will depend a lot on the tracks on which we will be racing. Yesterday one of the two McLarens approached the ones in front, but the other was behind us. I think it’s an open battle between us and McLaren. It is a challenge that always remains open and will be until the end. Even if, as I have often said, this is not our first goal.”
Since the double header at Red Bull, Ferrari has lost only 3 points in comparison with McLaren, although Spielberg was a fast track totally in favor of the “papaya” car: the challenge, therefore, remains open even if the Ferrari boss does not want to turn it into a sort of “derby” with the Woking team, preferring to belittle the race to be third force, which was the declared goal at the beginning of the year.
Mattia Binotto aims more at the progress of the team so that it is ready for the call of 2022, when, with the change of rules, Ferrari plans to disrupt the current values on the field to aim for the world title again.
If McLaren resembles Red Bull for the liveliness with which it produces developments, it can be said that Ferrari is comparable to Mercedes which at Silverstone should debut the latest updates and then only work on adapting the SF21 to the individual tracks, improving the understanding of the tires to keep afloat in a confrontation that, at least on paper, sees the Italian side unsuccessful against Andreas Seidl’s team.
The stakes in 2022 will be enormously more important than this year: the car that Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz have begun to discover in the simulator will be the one that will define the next three years of the history of the Maranello team, while the current red car will have a short life and will close a loop.
It is evident that there is no better way to end a transition season by grasping the starting objectives, giving consistency to a progress that exists, however difficult it is to decipher, and giving morale to a team that has very few opportunities to celebrate.
Perhaps Mattia Binotto wanted to shift attention from a target that is increasingly difficult to achieve, but the Ferrari Team Principal is aware that the hunt for the “papaya” team is the first motivation that pushes the Maranello team to squeeze the potential that remains in the SF21.
In slow corners like the Remus of the Red Bull Ring, the SF21 was scary to everyone, but then in the fast corners, the issues of the SF1000 emerge. The use of the tires is one of the keys that could determine the trend in the second half of the season.
And the adoption by Pirelli of rear tires with a stiffer carcass, in the end could play in favor of the Red that suffers from the overheating of the tires when it is forced to unload the wings to look for the maximum speeds that are missing due to a power unit which is unable to compete with Mercedes and Honda. And it wouldn’t be bad if the Scuderia could benefit from a change for once …
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