F1 | Vasseur: “We are disappointed, we wanted pole. DRS will be fundamental tomorrow”

Ferrari confirmed its strength and first rival of the Max Verstappen – Red Bull Racing duo by signing the second and third times in qualifying for the Miami Grand Prix respectively with Charles Leclerc ahead of Carlos Sainz.

The two drivers of the Red – who this weekend wear blue like the Scuderia’s mechanics – have reaffirmed their status as the second force of the grid, now in the hands of Ferrari since the start of the season. The SF-24s continue to lack upgrades, but they still prove to be very solid.

The fact that there is regret in the garage, thinking that the realistic objective could be pole, must be read as a good sign: it means that the team is not only ambitious, but thinks it has what it takes to beat Red Bull and to be able to put her in difficulty.

“Overall we achieved a good result with second and third place, placing ourselves between the Red Bulls who are first and fourth,” said Frédéric Vasseur to Sky Sport F1 at the end of qualifying in Miami.

“There is a bit of frustration after qualifying because we were hoping for a better result, but it was difficult for everyone to put together a good lap with the Softs. But overall the result is positive, we are in the top positions with both cars We’ll see how it goes tomorrow.”

Many teams, including Ferrari, had problems finding the limit on the flying lap using the Soft compounds. Although these give the best possible grip among the tires made by Pirelli, in Miami there were many drivers who made mistakes due to lack of grip. The race, however, will mainly take place with Medium and Hard, so the situation should be different.

“The race pace will be a different story compared to the flying lap also because we won’t be racing with the Softs. With the Softs overall I think we were all at the limit and if you exceeded a little you went too far. And this was true for our riders, but also for the other 18 cars”.

The Red’s race pace seen in the Sprint Race was encouraging. Leclerc finished the 19 laps of the race 2 seconds behind Verstappen and the tire degradation seen both on the SF-24 and on the rival single-seater suggests that Ferrari may be thinking of putting pressure on Red Bull.

“This morning we were slightly slower than Max during the Sprint Race, by 1 or 2 tenths. Max was very strong in the first 2-3 laps, then he suffered and then he returned to having a good pace. Tomorrow the first will be very important lap of the race. If we manage to catch the DRS in the first laps it will be very important because the DRS is very powerful here in Miami. And this means that we have to improve something starting from the first lap. The race will be long and the difference will be made in degradation. We had no problems this morning. We’ll see tomorrow.”

As for tomorrow’s start, Vasseur does not fear fratricidal maneuvers by his drivers. “We don’t need to talk to Charles and Carlos about leaving. They are professionals.”