Beating Red Bull won’t be easy, especially on a track like the 4.657-kilometre Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, where the best starting position will greatly increase the chances of winning. The C1, C2, and C3 compounds are a guarantee. They showed no issues during the long runs, and if it’s sunny on Sunday, it might be possible to complete the race with just one Medium-Hard stop. We’ll analyze this hypothesis at the end of qualifying.
Ferrari difficulties
The Prancing Horse of the Italian team still seemed a bit lackluster. It seemed more spirited compared to Canada, but still not as sharp as in the early races of the 2024 Formula 1 championship. Carlos Sainz, despite having new engine components, reported power issues during the first free practice sessions, which fortunately were resolved later.
Both drivers also suffered from balance issues that significantly impacted their performance. Charles Leclerc was additionally hindered by not testing the new updates brought by Ferrari (new floor, revised diffuser, and a new medium-high downforce rear wing) right away, which were allocated to Carlos Sainz in FP1, making the search for the optimal setup even more problematic.
The balance was not satisfactory on either car. There is room for improvement, of course, and if a solution is found, they could return to the fight for the podium.
McLaren tries to repeat Miami performance
As we can see from the times and the graph, Red Bull and McLaren have, even at a glance, an edge. Don’t be too influenced by those high times set by Max Verstappen; they will likely level out with the others during the race.
McLaren, however, has definitely impressed. Those times under 1’19” hint at something very good. Max Verstappen should still be the favorite for the race win in the Spanish Grand Prix, especially since he managed to match Oscar Piastri’s times with a disadvantageous compound, the Medium, but the Woking team wants to try for a repeat after the Miami Grand Prix.
If McLaren and Red Bull are the teams with the highest potential, it’s worth noting that the others aren’t too far behind. Looking at the graph, you can see how similar the levels are on the Soft compound (we only compared the times from the first stint: Mediums for Max Verstappen, Sergio Perez, and Fernando Alonso; the others on Softs) among Ferrari, Mercedes, and Lando Norris. So close that finding something during the night could make a difference on Sunday.
That’s the point. Ferrari has room for improvement, but everyone is so close that even a small detail can drastically change the outcome.
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