Ferrari promised them very happy at the 2022 Formula 1 French Grand Prix after two consecutive victories with their pair of drivers alternating at the top, with Carlos Sainz winning at Silverstone and Charles Leclerc doing the same in Austria.
However, since Friday, the Italian team’s weekend has turned into a nightmare due to the penalty received by the Spanish driver after changing several elements of his power unit.
That led the team to set a plan to give the Monegasque slipstream and thus get pole position, beating the Red Bulls, which they did, although they still had to finish the job on Sunday with a Leclerc who needed to cut points from Max Verstappen .
Everything seemed to be going smoothly in the Maranello box, but, suddenly, the Monaco man went against the protections, burying all the chances of victory when he was leading in Paul Ricard.
This caused all the alarms to go off after the driver said on the radio that it had been a problem related to the F1-75’s throttle, something that also happened at the Red Bull Ring when he got stuck towards the end of the test.
However, an embarrassed Ferrari boss, Mattia Binotto , denied all the rumors circulating in the paddock about a possible repetition of the breakdown: ” There has not been a mechanical problem, I know you said on the radio that there was a mishap, but it was because I had tried to get out of the protections with the reverse gear, and maybe I was not feeling the engine as it should.
“He has made a genuine mistake, sometimes it happens, like other times the power unit fails. And as a driver, when that happens, you feel disappointed,” acknowledged the team’s chief executive. “We have to look forward, next week we have the race in Hungary.”
On Sunday itself, Binotto explained that they believed it would be a good weekend given the pace of the car despite the misfortune that hung over Charles Leclerc: “We expected to be very strong because we had a great package, better degradation and a Good rhythm”.
“Carlos [Sainz] has also had a fantastic race starting from the back, he has been overtaking car by car until he finished at the top, he has a great car, just like us we have two fantastic drivers, and now we look at the next appointment in search of a better result,” said the Swiss director.
When asked about which of his two drivers was faster in the French weekend, Binotto assured on the DAZN F1 microphones that he did not know: “I don’t know the comparison between the two, they were very close and we saw in qualifying that Carlos had a great Q2, a very good lap, so it shows that he has the confidence and speed, which is what we need.”
“As a team we want both drivers to go fast, and that’s great for us,” said the Ferrari boss, who is already setting his sights on next week’s Hungarian Grand Prix.
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