Scuderia Ferrari decided to go for a single pit stop in the 2021 Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort circuit, with both Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz who started the race on the soft tyres, extended the first stint as long as possible and them finished the race on the hard compound.
Finishing the race on a single stop was not only difficult for Valtteri Bottas (who in the final laps stopped for a second pitstop) but also for Carlos Sainz, as confirmed by the Spanish driver at the end of the race. Carlos was never at ease in the car yesterday. Excessive sliding of both the front and rear caused uncontrollable degradation, especially in the second stint. The lack of pace on the Hard tyres led the Spanish driver to lose sixth position on the last lap to, being overtaken by Fernando Alonso (Alpine), who was able to brilliantly manage his stint on the Medium compound and finish the race with a single stop (SM) .
Although not satisfied with the behavior of the SF21 in any of the 72 laps of the Grand Prix, we must say that Carlos did not behave so badly until the 50th lap. By replacing the Soft on lap 31 with Hard, Ferrari hoped to be able to get the better of Gasly’s AlphaTauri with both cars. Pierre had made the stop with 7 laps early by choosing to use the Mediums. Nobody at that moment could believe that the Frenchman would be able to finish the GP without a further stop (his S-M strategy).
Returning to Carlos Sainz, the pace in the first part of the race was not bad. Certainly not at the level of Charles Leclerc, but in any case such as to allow him to build a nice buffer between himself and the Alpine # 14. During the 52nd lap, the peak of the gap is reached. Carlos has gained a gap of 19.5 ’over his compatriot from Oviedo. Then the ‘collapse’. Suddenly the pace doesn’t improve. On lap 53 Carlos Sainz starts receiving blue flags and perhaps this could be one of the causes behind it all.
Times do not go down. While Gasly, Charles Leclerc and Alonso begin to descend at 11’14’s medium, Carlos remains stable at 11’15’s high. Fernando recovers 8 seconds in just 5 laps and by lap 62 he is already 5 ‘behind the Ferrari driver. Two laps later he will be able to open the DRS. Carlos Sainz will defend himself as he can, but then right at the start of the last lap, the two-time world champion manages to make the most of the mobile wing and complete the overtaking before the ‘Tarzan’, turn-1.
Here the Maranello team may have made a mistake, so to speak, of ‘presumption’. Had he called the Madrid driver back to the pits at the first signs by useing an additional Soft tyre, perhaps we would be talking about another result. On the other hand, the second stop would have meant finding himself behind Norris in 9th position. So, to get back in sixth, the Spaniard would have had to make at least three overtakes. The Ferrari technicians did not feel like taking this risk. Net of everything, Carlos Sainz only lost one position.
It should be remembered that the Spaniard had a fairly important crash on Saturday morning. The mechanics managed to repair the car in time for qualifying, but it cannot be ruled out that in the rush some adjustments may not be made correctly. The Maranello team and the driver will thoroughly investigate the possible causes of this sudden lack of rhythm and feeling.
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