The first official Formula 1 weekend didn’t go in the best way possible for Scuderia Ferrari, as Charles Leclerc was forced to retire on lap 41 due to a mechanical problem, while his Maranello teammate Carlos Sainz finished outside the podium, in fourth position, after being passed by Fernando Alonso, who therefore only his second podium position since 2014, when he was racing for Ferrari.
Marc Gené admitted the Maranello team was really surprised by the “completely unexpected” reliability issue at the Bahrain Grand Prix. The Monegasque had to retire on lap 41 when his car lost power, while Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez claimed a dominant 1-2 for Red Bull at the Sakhir circuit.
The words of Marc Gene
Marc Gene, speaking on the microphones of the F1 Nation podcast, said: “Last year we started the season very well but we didn’t finish the same way, so I hope that this trend that whoever wins the first race then doesn’t win the championship can continue, even if it will be difficult” – the Spanish professional racing driver explained.
“We improved in some areas. I think the car was fast, we really could have scored pole in Bahrain. We suffered with reliability, and that’s really something totally unexpected. Then obviously tire management also affected us. These are problems we were already aware of” – he continued.
On car number #16 the control unit and battery had been changed before the Bahrain Grand Prix, thus bringing the number of parts used already to two, the maximum allowed for the whole season before penalties are given. However, Marc Gené insists that this decision was taken as a precaution, and not because of real problems with the replaced components:
Show your support for Scuderia Ferrari with official merchandise collection! Click here to enter the F1 online Store and shop securely! And also get your F1 tickets for every race with VIP hospitality and unparalleled insider access. Click here for the best offers to support Charles and Carlos from the track!
“We changed the parts because from the data we saw some problems. But we are sure that the issue, and the subsequent retirement, were caused by other components that we had not changed. It was only a precautionary move and we are sure that it has nothing to do with with what happened to Charles,” – the Ferrari ambassador added.
Max Verstappen won the Bahrain Grand Prix 12 seconds ahead of his Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez, while third placed Fernando Alonso was a further 26s down.
“For us a podium would have been a very good result. Honestly it was looking good. Even at some point Charles was keeping up with the soft compound, which was the compound we were expecting the worst for us, and Charles was quite strong. Then we put the hard compound, we’re expecting it to be the good compound for us, and we were nowhere. What we saw in the pre- season testing we didn’t see today on the tyres.” – Marc Gene continued.
“We were aiming for the podium, and I think Charles would eventually have got it, not with a margin but I think he would have had upped the pace, but so it was very disappointing to miss out both for Charles and then of course for Carlos.”
Marc Gene believes Scuderia Ferrari can improve in the second round of the 2023 Formula 1 championship, the Bahrain Grand Prix, which will take place in Saudi Arabia, given the fact that the Jeddah Corniche circuit should better suit the SF-23 car:
“One another strong point for Ferrari is we are very fast on the straight,” said the Spaniard. “You could see we managed to defend from Aston from Mercedes. In the past Ferrari was very weak on that respect. For me Jeddah is very important because it’s a high-speed track. I think our cars should be very strong there. That’s my personal feeling. But yeah Red Bull… on qualifying we can be them, Charles could have gotten pole. But the tyre degradation is unbelievable. Today they were managing it. We know they’re hard to beat but it’s only the first of the 23, a long way to go.” – Marc Gene concluded.
Leave a Reply