On the crazy Sunday in Suzuka that crowned Max Verstappen world champion for the second consecutive time with four races ahead of the end of the 2022 Formula One season, the hopes of the Ferrari fans were all linked to Charles Leclerc.
The Monegasque, however, after keeping the pace of the Red Bull driver in the first part of the race, found himself five seconds behind his Dutch rival following the pit stop to switch from ‘wet’ to intermediate tires. At this point Charles Leclerc immediately tried to reduce the gap that was created, however putting his tires under excessive stress.
According to Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto, it is for this reason that performance of his F1-75 car collapsed in the second part of the Japanese race was due, when the Ferrari driver even lost a second per lap as compared to Max Verstappen, instead finding himself under pressure from the other Red Bull of Sergio Perez.
Interviewed by Sky Sport F1, Mattia Binotto, who followed the race from the remote garage in Maranello, provided more detail on the problems suffered by the only F1-75 left on track after the retirement of Carlos Sainz.
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“Regarding Charles Leclerc’s pace, the hypothesis is that he pushed too hard at the beginning and did not manage the tires well, which degraded and had graining. In the wet then you do not clean them anymore. Leclerc himself commented on the radio that he was unable to turn the car – the Ferrari boss admitted – the first laps in which he tried to catch up on Max compromised the entire race. It is something to learn from, also because we had already seen something on Friday. It also takes a bit of mea culpa. On the dry and wet laps the car proved to be competitive and to be able to fight for pole and victory – concluded Mattia Binotto – today Max was the best and managed the tires well. But we understood the problems we had in Spa and addressed them in some way. There are still four races left, in which we will try to achieve the result that we haven’t achieved for too many races ” – Mattia Binotto added.
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