Ferrari team principal Frédéric Vasseur commented bitterly on the result in Baku. In his view, the car had the pace, but everything was thrown away due to errors in qualifying, forcing Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton to start from the middle of the grid.
Baku, like Monza, had high expectations for Ferrari given the low downforce circuits, but instead the team had to lick its wounds while seeing Mercedes overtake them in the Constructors’ Championship, taking second place behind the untouchable McLaren.
After a disappointing weekend, Vasseur spoke to Sky Sport about Ferrari’s performance in Azerbaijan. The French manager was visibly frustrated with a result that he had hoped would be drastically different.
Monza and Baku seemed ideal tracks for Ferrari. Why wasn’t the pace there?
“No, the pace was there. And that’s exactly why it’s frustrating. We had a very strong pace on Friday. We couldn’t put it all together on Saturday, and today we got stuck in traffic behind Norris and Tsunoda. Overtaking on the straight was difficult, and in the last 30 laps we remained in traffic. To be honest, we lost the weekend yesterday in qualifying, not today in the race. Starting behind Norris today was one thing, but yesterday our team had the potential to do better, and we didn’t.”
Why does Ferrari sometimes struggle to put it all together?
“Honestly, it’s hard to analyze. We’ve had excellent races when McLaren was flying, like in Australia and other occasions. But when they’re not fighting for the win, neither are we. I think it’s because our car shares characteristics with the McLaren, while Mercedes and Red Bull are more similar to each other. So when McLaren doesn’t shine, neither do we. When they win, we’re the first behind them. I’m a bit angry. If we had secured the front row yesterday, today’s race would have been completely different.”
Issues on the straights?
“We had an energy recovery problem. It wasn’t consistent across all laps. In the last 20 laps, we were missing a couple of kilowatts, and I think that was enough to prevent overtaking. We weren’t losing much engine power, but we simply couldn’t make the pass.”
Friday pace strong, but struggles on Saturday and Sunday. Why?
“We’ve used the same approach since the start of the season, and the gap to others is similar from Friday to Saturday. Everyone has their routines with fuel and engines. Since Spa, we’ve improved, but we still struggle to put everything together. We make choices that don’t pay off, we make mistakes, and we get unlucky. We’re not opportunistic enough, which is crucial in races like these. We were fast on Friday in the heat, but couldn’t repeat it in the following days. At least in Singapore, the temperature will be high again.”
Staff leaving Maranello. Are you ready for 2026?
“The stories about personnel leaving Maranello are a joke. Turnover is normal. In recent months, we’ve recruited 60 people from other teams. So this discussion should die down. I’ve read names in the press, but it’s a joke that only hurts the team. I don’t want to dwell on it. I’m not worried about next year. I’m convinced we have a team that can win, but we need to improve in every aspect and maintain our approach. We have to keep pushing in the same direction and be more opportunistic throughout the weekend.”
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