It is a qualification that perhaps leaves a slight bitter taste in the mouth at Ferrari, because the fifth and seventh place in the Sprint Qualifying cannot completely leave behind concepts, as the Prancing Horse Team Principal himself, Fred Vasseur, put it.
The first competitive session of the weekend was affected by rain, which gradually began to wet the track until intermediate tires were necessary in SQ3. In fact, only Hamilton tried something different, mounting an intermediate that had remained warm after a long wait in the tyrewarmers, unlike his rivals who had immediately lined up in the pit lane. The Englishman thus had to return to the pits, losing a lap compared to his rivals, even if in reality it had no influence on the final result.
Ferrari's SQ3 also started with some moments of tension, because on the exit lap from the pits with cold tires Charles Leclerc immediately lost the car, ending up on the wall in the second sector on an extremely slippery track. The Monegasque suffered a broken front wing, thus having to immediately return to the pits to replace the damaged parts and change a set of intermediate tyres.
Carlos Sainz, Ferrari SF-24
Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images
Like Hamilton, Leclerc also had time to complete at least two attempts, although in the second he was unable to improve on the time achieved previously, thus slipping to seventh place. On the contrary, Carlos Sainz managed to take about two seconds off the time obtained at the start of SQ3, thus positioning himself ahead of Sergio Perez, who divides the two Reds.
The Red Team Principal did not hide a hint of bitterness, due to the fact that the SF-24 was unable to bring the tires to the right temperature, so much so that it had a rather significant gap from the leading riders.
“I haven't spoken to Charles yet, so I'm not sure what happened. It's true that the conditions were very treacherous with very little grip and we struggled to warm up the tyres, but it was the same for everyone”, explained Vasseur, who has greater confidence in the dry conditions rather than the wet ones, a feeling shared by the two pilots.
“We need to understand if we can do something else, but it was the first time for the car in these extreme conditions. Also, I think the fact that the asphalt was covered with bitumen didn't help the drivers, but it happened the way it did. We need to learn from this first wet session of the season, the rest of the weekend should be dry.”
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari SF-24
Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images
With only one free practice session available after five years of absence from this track, the preparation phase for the weekend at home will be fundamental, as will be learning from the data recorded in the morning. Vasseur confirmed that Ferrari is focusing heavily on the rest of the weekend, having also opted for a different strategy from a tire point of view: Ferrari was in fact one of the few teams to use just one set of tires for the entire FP1.
Furthermore, it was the only one to use a single set of tyres, thus using neither the hard nor the medium, compounds that the teams see more from a race perspective. Mercedes used only one set of tires, but took advantage of the hard one, which will therefore be lost for the rest of the weekend. For example, however, Red Bull used both a set of medium and soft tires.
For this reason, the Red team believes it can have an advantage in the rest of the weekend with a wider selection available: “It will be a complicated weekend, first of all because we haven't been to China for five years now, so we didn't have data with these cars and the asphalt is rather strange. But this applies to everyone in the end and this means that we must be faster than others and react.”
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari SF-24, Oscar Piastri, McLaren MCL38, Esteban Ocon, Alpine A524, out of the pits
Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images
“I hope that the strategy adopted so far is the right one, because we were the only ones to have left an extra set of medium and hard tires compared to the others this morning. This means that we will have a wider choice of tires for tomorrow. But, like everyone, we are a bit blind, it's not a simple choice, this morning we did a few laps and we have to learn from there. Let's hope they are enough to make a good decision this evening and be in the fight tomorrow,” added Vasseur, before confirming that Ferrari is concretely aiming for Sunday's race.
“The sprint will certainly be an opportunity to score points, but clearly we will also have to choose the compound well this evening, because we have to consider that it can be a starting point for Sunday. As mentioned, we have the advantage of still having a set of new medium tires for tomorrow, while our rivals will have to use a set of used medium tyres.”
“It can be an advantage for tomorrow but also a better preparation for Sunday, where the most points are awarded, so we need to focus on this. Since the beginning of the weekend we have placed our priority on Sunday and we don't want to change our approach.”
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