A month without F1, but it will be a month of re-equipping for the top teams who, from Austin, will field the final update packages for the 2024 season for the remaining six races on the calendar.
Ferrari looks to the United States GP with a certain amount of confidence, even if the Texan track is certainly not one of the most congenial to the SF-24. The red team, with the latest update brought to the temple of speed, has taken a decisive step forward, erasing the doubts of the summer and re-proposing itself as the second force chasing McLaren which, in the meantime, has become the reference single-seater to the detriment of a Red Bull that seems to have lost its way in development, except for having registered a sign of awakening in Singapore.
Scuderia Ferrari celebrates Leclerc’s victory at Monza
Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images
The Scuderia’s haul in the trio of races that were supposed to showcase the SF-24’s talents (Monza, Baku and Singapore) has been declining: Charles Leclerc’s sensational success in the Italian GP was followed by the Monegasque’s defeat in Azerbaijan at the hands of Oscar Piastri and, finally, there was the disappointing result in Marina Bay, where the Maranello team was perhaps aiming to have two cars on the podium. The disastrous qualifying that sent Leclerc and Sainz crashing to the fifth row, produced a fifth and seventh place that did not satisfy the Cavallino’s appetites.
McLaren has scored 112 points in three GPs, Ferrari 71, followed by Mercedes with 54 and Red Bull, fourth, with 41. The numbers say, therefore, that the reds have lost 41 points to McLaren in just three events and the gap from the Woking team has risen to 75 points.
Thinking of challenging the team led by Andrea Stella for the Constructors’ title is a pipe dream, while an attack on Red Bull’s second place could be achievable, given that the gap from the Milton Keynes team is only 34 points, if only the two drivers start to score important points again.
Ferrari SF-24 damaged by Carlos Sainz in Singapore Q3
Photo by: Lionel Ng / Motorsport Images
The numbers say that Carlos Sainz has not been on the podium since the Austrian GP: seven races have passed and that is definitely too many. Sure, in Monza the Spaniard made himself available to Leclerc to slow down Piastri’s comeback, but in Baku he threw away a second place in the clash with Sergio Perez and in Singapore, thanks to the crash on the Q3 launch lap, he settled for seventh place after starting tenth.
The Madrid native now feels like a foreign element to the team and gives the clear sensation of having been subjected to the role of Charles’ right-hand man, while he could still aspire to a… jolt with an SF-24 that has decidedly grown under the “care” of the technical director, Fred Vasseur, who has coordinated the group of Italians (Diego Tondi, Fabio Montecchi, Marco Adurno) in the relaunch of the red team even in the absence of the resigning Enrico Cardile.
Loic Serra will be technical director from October 1st with Jerome d’Ambrosio the new vice team principal
Photo by: Ferrari
From next Tuesday, the technical director’s stripes will pass to Loic Serra who enters the Racing Department bringing his experience gained in Mercedes: the Frenchman, according to rumors, will not have a hand in the latest developments of the SF-24, but will give his contribution to the 2025 car and, above all, will direct the technical group for the 2026 project.
Even Leclerc is not free from criticism: the Q3 mess in Singapore put Ferrari out of the running for a front row and a podium, throwing away the efforts that the Gestione Sportiva had made to anticipate the debut of the new front wing, the first interpretation of profiles capable of deforming according to a programmed flexion. At home, both the aerodynamics and composites departments worked miracles to put the two reds in a position to fight with McLaren, but the two drivers thought it best to ruin everything.
Austin, therefore, will become a strategic appointment: each top team will play its last chips on the table for the final rush that is still worth a quarter of the season! McLaren and Mercedes have already learned the lesson of flexible front wings, while Ferrari and Red Bull will try to fill the gap right from Texas.
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari SF-24
Photo by: Lionel Ng / Motorsport Images
The Scuderia, having brought forward the debut of the wing in Singapore, will have the advantage over the world champion team of being able to analyse the data collected in the last event, having enough time to straighten out the aim in view of the American race and propose the most extreme solution allowed by the regulations.
Ferrari, now that it has found a good balance on the SF-24, does not plan to hit rock bottom, but is defining other small interventions useful for making the red car balanced on the various tracks that make up the tail end of the calendar.
The potential to win the “derby” with Red Bull should be there. We will have to see if the team will be able to convert the effort being made in Maranello into points: last year Ferrari finished third in the Constructors’ Championship.
Mercedes has already been overtaken (there is a gap of 112 points!), while the overtaking of the world champion team must be completed. The leap would be important because the two opponents who preceded the red team last year would be overtaken. The rise and explosion of McLaren, on the other hand, was not foreseeable, but it would not be a disgrace to finish behind the papaya cars.
Is targeting what seemed like an uncatchable Red Bull an illusion or a hope?
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