At the end of the Grand Prix ofSaudi ArabiaFrederic Vasseur stopped to talk about the disappointing performance of the two Ferraris, who finished respectively in sixth and seventh position.
Once again it was a disastrous ‘three days’ for Ferrari. After the worrying pre-season tests (labelled by some as absolutely useless for evaluating the cars) and the disastrous weekend in Bahrain, the very fast Jeddah circuit has once again confirmed how much this SF23 is closer to the ‘midfield’ of the grid rather than his head. Red Bull belongs totally in another category to the rest of the grid, but as things stand now the Prancing Horse is behind even Aston Martin and Mercedes. What should have been a favorable track for Ferrari turned out to be even worse than Bahrain in terms of outright performance.
These are the words of team principal Frederic Vasseur at the end of the race:
“Definitely not the result we expected. After such a tough weekend we have to analyze the situation. I think there are some positive aspects: the first stint was good, Leclerc managed to climb up to sixth place starting twelfth. Carlos was stuck behind Stroll, but in the last part of the race with the Hard tires we didn’t have the pace. We have to understand why and where it comes from, because it is unacceptable. We need to correct as soon as possible.”
With Mercedes in the process of distorting its project, one wonders if even the famous philosophy of wide bellies hasn’t already reached the end of the line.
“We still believe in our project,” continued Vasseur. “I can’t imagine that a car capable of conquering the front row in qualifying and then in the race doesn’t work. I think it’s more a setup problem than a philosophy one. Tire management issue. We didn’t use the soft set with Carlos as we were all a bit in the dark for the first stint. In retrospect, it’s easier to say that it was better to start with the reds, but almost everyone started with the mediums. With the if you go nowhere, I don’t have to tell lies. The good thing is that Charles was third in Bahrain and on the front row in Arabia. The downside is that as soon as we put on the hard ones we struggle and are unable to replicate the performance we do with the softer compounds.
“When I arrived at Ferrari I had the picture of the current situation, but not that of the opponents. When you go on the track you compare yourself with the others and maybe the others have improved more than you. In fact I said it’s important to keep pushing and developing the car. I know it’s difficult to say this after a weekend like this, but I think we made a good step forward in terms of flying lap and we gained over Mercedes and Aston. There are 21 races to go, we will work to improve starting in Melbourne. We won’t give up.”