Qatar F1 Sprint, Ferrari SF-23 analysis: overheating with soft tires. Mediums saved for race. Ferrari SF-23 analysis from Qatar F1 Sprint race.

Ferrari’s imperfect weekend continues. Let’s start by discussing the pre-race scenario. For the 19 laps of the Sprint Race, teams made rather different choices regarding their tire selection. Let’s review as the choice between Soft and Medium tires played a decisive role. Both McLaren cars opted for the Pirelli yellow-banded tires, while Ferrari went with the Softs. The Soft tire provides extra grip but has a narrower working range, making it more challenging to manage.

The choice of the yellow-banded Medium compound was undoubtedly the safest decision in terms of durability, considering that these tires should have come into their own in the middle of the race. We saw how the McLaren team had a strong belief in these tires, even though Norris, at the start, lost positions for two simple reasons: his MCL60 was placed on the dirty side of the grid and had less grip due to the tires.

Red Bull also made the same choice as McLaren, relying on durability and the later phase of the race. This decision was also influenced by the fact that the RB19 adapted very well to the slightly harder tire. Mercedes, on the other hand, split the strategy between their two drivers: Mediums for Hamilton and Softs for Russell. The red tires helped George make the overtake on Piastri, allowing him to brake very late and put a lot of load on his W14 during the turn-in.

During the first few laps, two Safety Car interventions occurred, scenarios that did not affect the race strategy. As clearly seen, from lap 9 onwards, a crossover occurred, and the Medium tire became more performance-oriented. Meanwhile, the Soft tire started to struggle significantly, to the point where its performance cliff might have arrived even before the finish line.

George Russell’s tires were completely worn out, as he himself stated on the radio. Fortunately, the triple intervention by Bernd Mayländer helped the drivers on red tires, and the third Safety Car allowed them to bring these tires back into the optimal operating window, which had gone into overheating. Nevertheless, considering the roughness of the Qatari asphalt, the Softs had already suffered from significant thermal degradation.

Ferrari SF-23: Poor Race Pace with Soft Tires
The graph provided by the editorial team of FUnoanalisitecnica highlights the tire behavior evolution, comparing the Sprint Race of Oscar Piastri and George Russell, who used Medium and Soft tires, respectively, for this 100 km mini-race.

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The red tires suffered from a performance deficit in the middle part of the stint. In the final laps, thanks to the third Safety Car, the red-banded Pirelli “caught its breath” and returned to the correct usage window. We’re talking about a tire compound that will not be used by most drivers in today’s usual Sunday race. This is because, as we’ve seen, it exhibits strong and rapid degradation.

Ferrari decided to go for the softest tire option available for a specific reason: having an extra set of Medium tires for the race starting this late afternoon. Below, we provide the performance values from the Sprint Race. McLaren won the race, but they were on par with Red Bull, whose driver, Verstappen, has been crowned the world champion for the third time in his career, despite the difficult conditions in the top motorsport category on Saturday.

Mercedes followed closely with an average gap of about 1.15 seconds per lap. Although the distance from McLaren and Red Bull was quite substantial, the Brackley-based team was the third-strongest in the race. Aston Martin and Ferrari were next, both with an average gap of 1.5 seconds per lap. Even Williams approached the performance of the red car, running approximately a tenth of a second slower when considering the total average for this fourth F1 Sprint of the 2023 Formula One season.

Source: Alessandro Arcari and Niccoló Arnerich for FUnoanalisitecnica