Ferrari drivers agree on alarming Red Bull and McLaren verdict after Hungarian GP setback
Carlos Sainz walking back to the garage with Charles Leclerc
The three-team battle for victory has dwindled to just two: McLaren and Red Bull Racing. After qualifying for the Hungarian Grand Prix, both of Ferrari’s drivers agree that they had expected to be on form… but weren’t.
Ongoing bouncing problems have plagued both Ferraris, as Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz admit that they’ve begun approaching the Hungarian GP weekend with a mindset of maximizing their own performance, not competing with the frontrunners.
Charles Leclerc: “We don’t have the performance”
Ferrari’s SF-24 has been plagued with ongoing bouncing issues since the most recent ruleset was introduced in 2022, but those issues have been exacerbated by a performance upgrade the Scuderia brought to Barcelona.
That upgrade, considered a ‘performance’ rather than a handling upgrade, has helped add pace, according to the drivers. However, the car has become more challenging to drive, and both the Red Bull and McLaren upgrades have provided rival teams with an advantage over the Prancing Horse.
“I think also coming into the weekend, I knew that we needed more to get back to the level of McLaren and Red Bull,” Charles Leclerc admitted to media after qualifying.
“But I think the best thing we could do this weekend is to […] maximize this weekend, which honestly I think we did.
“The biggest problem now is that we don’t have the performance to do much better.
“So that’s where we’ll focus on in the development for the future.”
Carlos Sainz will start the Hungarian GP from fourth, with Leclerc in sixth. The pair were separated by the Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton.
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Despite some tweaks to the package Ferrari brought to the Hungaroring, Carlos Sainz told media “we are at the same disadvantage that we had in the last three or four races, the same percentage of lap time that we were missing.
“So even if the new [package] might have been working well, it shows that we’re still a long way.”
In FP1, Ferrari seemed quick, but Sainz credits that to the track temperatures.
“With very high temps, it seemed like we could be a bit closer to the leaders, but as soon as everything cooled down, three or four tenths was the gap that we’ve had to Lando all weekend, and three or four tenths was the gap in quali to every single one,” he explained.
Sainz said he’d like more time to analyze the data regarding the package tweaks in order to understand if they’re really working, but he did caution the assembled media members, “Yesterday I was trying to keep everyone a bit calm because I knew today that some reality checks were going to happen.”
Speaking to Sky Sports, Charles Leclerc added, “We are the fourth, maybe the third fastest, car. We are very similar to Mercedes… but unfortunately, McLaren and Red Bull now have got a long way ahead.”
However, it appears that the team’s attempts at pushing itself to match the pace of the frontrunners haven’t been working. Now, Ferrari seems dedicated to finding its footing within the team.
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