A bitter Qatar for Ferrari: Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc do not go beyond fourth and fifth place in the Sprint Shootout of the Losail F1 GP. Free Practice turned out to be just a sweet illusion so far: McLaren flies, as predicted, and the wildcard George Russell joins the fray. However, the weekend has only just begun, and anything can still happen.
In the Qatari evening, Lando Norris smiles: finally free from the pressure of the championship fight, the Englishman doesn’t put a foot wrong and secures an excellent pole position despite aborting his last flying lap. McLaren meets the pre-race expectations and places both cars in the Top 3, interspersed with yet another astonishing performance by George Russell.
For Ferrari, it’s time to come back down to earth and prepare for a comeback. Free Practice provided encouraging feedback on race pace, and with a few tweaks to the setup, today’s qualifying session could yield better results. Positive indications also came from the experimental floor – especially with a view toward 2025 – which was confirmed on Charles Leclerc’s car.
Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc struggle in Qatar: understeer alarm for Ferrari
The two Ferrari drivers are certainly not happy with the result of the Sprint Shootout. The most dejected is Charles Leclerc, who does not mince words: “It didn’t go well. When you give your best and end up P4 and P5, it’s not good. FP1 was above our expectations, now we’re back to reality. After Free Practice, we thought we could do something better, but that wasn’t the case.”
Carlos Sainz, on the other hand, is more straightforward in identifying the SF-24’s problem: “I try not to focus too much on FP1 results because you don’t know the others’ engine mappings and fuel loads. We went into qualifying knowing our rivals would be fast, and that’s what happened. I think tomorrow we can improve the car.” – the Spanish driver pointed out at he end of the Sprint Shootout.
“With the mediums, we accumulated a lot of understeer,” explained the Spaniard, “and we weren’t able to get the car to turn.” The Sprint Race is scheduled for Saturday, November 30, at 3:00 PM.
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