Carlos Sainz Jr. started the second half of the season, to put it in terms more suited to other sports, in excellent form. The victory obtained last weekend at the Singapore Grand Prix is the sublimation of the good things already shown in Monza with third place behind the elusive Red Bulls.
A state of grace, which perhaps had never been achieved by the Madrilenian since he ran under the banner of the Prancing Horse. Carlos’ performances stand out even more when compared to those of Charles Leclerc, who appeared less brilliant compared to the first half of the 2023 Formula 1 season.
It’s not just a question of the results obtained on Sunday, because Sainz also managed to do better on the flying lap, notoriously one of the Monegasque’s strong points, and moreover on one of the 25-year-old former Alfa Romeo’s favorite tracks.
At the end of the Marina Bay weekend, Charles Leclerc gave an interesting photograph of his situation, which is directly linked to that of the SF-23. At Zandvoort Ferrari used the race weekend to carry out various tests, bringing important responses to Maranello.
From that moment on, measures were taken to make the Red car less nervous and less unpredictable. This resulted in a change in the setup and balance of the car, with an increase in understeer.
It is no coincidence that Sainz is now more comfortable with this year’s car and, at the same time, Leclerc has lost the shine he had shown in the first races, even with a Red car that is far from being the desired car .
“At Zandvoort we did a lot of tests. At Monza we wanted to reconfirm what we saw in the tests and the understanding we had of the car. From Singapore we applied everything and it seemed like we were taking a big step forward.”
“That said, Singapore has historically been a very good track for us, so we have to wait for another race to understand whether we have made a really good and consistent step forward or whether it was an isolated case.”
Carlos Sainz, Ferrari SF-23, Charles Leclerc, Ferrari SF-23
Photo by: Ferrari
In Miami, Ferrari introduced a fund that had the task of making the SF-23 more predictable. But Leclerc claims that to improve the situation the team had to rely more on set-up changes. This, in his opinion, would have meant that he was forced to abandon some settings that made the car oversteer, or closer to his driving tastes, to prevent it from being too nervous.
“It’s fantastic to have Carlos in this form because it also pushes me to understand my driving style a little more and try to adapt it to this car. At the moment I don’t feel completely comfortable with the car. There is a a little too much understeer for my tastes and I struggle to drive it. Due to the unpredictability of the car I can’t have the oversteer I would like.”
“There is some work to do, but first of all it’s nice to see that at least there seems to be competitiveness. Now it’s up to me to try to recover. We have a very unpredictable car and therefore, precisely because of this unpredictability, we have to pay attention to the balance”.
“We can’t race with a lot of front end, because every time there is a sprint we lose a lot of grip and the car is difficult to manage. It’s not that the SF-23 is an understeering single-seater, but it’s just that you have to put some understeer in the car to make it predictable and that makes things more difficult for me,” concluded Leclerc.
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