Twenty-four points separate Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz in the Drivers’ standings, ahead of the British Grand Prix next weekend.
At the start of the 2022 Formula 1 season, the Monegasque driver was consistently one step ahead of the Spaniard both in qualifying and in race pace. The former McLaren driver tried to keep up with his Maranello teammate, but ran into several driving errors in Melbourne, Imola and Miami. After a disappointing Spanish Grand Prix for Ferrari and Carlos Sainz in front of his own fans, also due to the reliability problems suffered by Charles Leclerc, Carlos has been able to match Charles in the rankings during the last few races.
In Monaco the single stop going directly from the full wet to the slick tires against the two made by Charles Leclerc – who also mounted the intermediates before the dry ones – allowed Carlos Sainz to arrive in front of the Monegasque driver at the end of the Monte Carlo race, while in Canada just over a week ago, Carlos finished in second place behind Max Verstappen while Charles Leclerc was forced to recover from the back of the starting grid due to the penalties which were received for the introduction of new components of the power that exceeded the three allowed by the regulation.
Now at Silvestone Ferrari has the goal of reversing the trend of six races won by Red Bull, who was able to dominate despite the fact that in terms of pace the F1-75 cars were overall better performing than the RB18 challengers. Charles Leclerc has always been enthusiastic on the British track and now that he can push without fear of reliability problems it will not be easy for Carlos Sainz to keep up with his teammate even if the confidence at the wheel of the F1-75 has recently increased for the Spaniard.
Regarding any hierarchies to be established between the two Ferrari drivers with the goal of avoiding to lose more ground to Max Verstappen, who currently has 49 points ahead of Charles Leclerc, former Scuderia Ferrari driver Rubens Barrichello said: “I don’t want to talk about this type of situations, because then I am targeted in Brazil for my judgments. I only want to say that Ferrari has two very good drivers, the rest is politics and I don’t care” – these were the words of the Brazilian in a recent interview for Italian daily newspaper La Gazzetta dello Sport.
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According to Rubinho, with 13 races still to go until the end of the 2022 Formula 1 season, Scuderia Ferrari has plenty of time to recover the gap to Red Bull, reliability allowing: “Ferrari has all the credentials, after all up to three races ago they were practically ahead, why couldn’t it happen again? Just a blink of an eye and the situation is reversed. The key is to do your homework right before the race and then transfer it to the GP weekend. But yes, Red Bull is fast and looks reliable. To win the championship you need both of these ingredients” – Rubens Barrichello concluded.
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