Spanish GP Qualifying, Ferrari on the third row
The updates brought at the 4.657-kilometre Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya did not give Ferrari the boost needed to fix its biggest weakness so far: the pace in qualifying. At Montmeló, a circuit where overtaking is very difficult, the SF-24 cars occupy the third row and will need a good start and a strong race pace to hope for a podium finish in the Spanish Grand Prix tomorrow.
Frederic Vasseur’s comments
Frederic Vasseur, team principal of Ferrari, is clearly not satisfied with today’s result and regrets an error by Charles Leclerc that cost the Monegasque the second row: “First of all, we decided to save a set of tires for tomorrow, Mercedes did not do that and I think it will be an advantage for the first stint. We are a bit disappointed because Charles made a mistake in turn 5 and I think we lost an easy third position in that corner, but it’s part of the game: we are very close and you have to push, mistakes happen in the end. I am not a big fan of this type of track, with long corners, but overall we had a good qualifying,” commented the Frenchman to Sky Sport F1. “We need to put everything together for tomorrow, and tomorrow the temperature will be a bit cooler: we hope this will go in our favor. We hope to catch up with the leaders.” – the Ferrari boss explained.
“Did I expect to be closer to McLaren? No, because the others also bring parts, they are not sleeping, and also because on this type of track the impact of tire management is much greater than the weight of the updates,” he continued. “Clearly it is important to have a couple of tenths more or less, it is always a nice boost, but in the end we have to make do with what we have, have a good race tomorrow, bring home some points. We know that until the end of the season it will be like this, with ups and downs, with some weekends where we will be in front and others where we will be in the third row. And when we are in the third row the goal will be to score as many points as possible. Clearly when it comes to scoring points, we always want to do better than the starting position and recover: there are still 15-16 races left, so it is important to score many points every weekend.” – the French manager added at the end of the qualifying session in Barcelona.
“We have a new set of tires, we have the pace, we can catch up with the top two, at least we can try to pass the two Mercedes and fight for the podium. And if you are third and fourth you score more points than those who finished first and tenth. Cold track an advantage? I think we would be in better conditions. At the beginning of qualifying we were faster and the track was a bit cooler, and in the race, I think the direction will be that.”- the Ferrari team principal concluded.
