In fact, he is very adamant in defending his strategy department and while he accepts that there is always room for improvement, he is clear that he has the right people in the right positions.
This is something that may come as a surprise to some Formula 1 fans, who have been heavily critical of the team for what appeared to be a series of critical mistakes this season that have dampened Charles Leclerc’s prospects for the championship.
In Monaco, with Leclerc leading, they weren’t quick to respond to the fact that the track was drying out after Serio Pérez switched to slicks.
This was then compounded by a poorly timed second stop which allowed Max Verstappen to overtake Leclerc as well.
At the British GP, Ferrari failed to pit Leclerc during the final safety car period, dropping from first to fourth at the end.
Later, in Hungary, the choice of the hard compound left the Monegasque unable to fend off title rival Verstappen on a day when the team’s real problem was really the F1-75’s lack of performance.
Added to this, there is also the way the strategy turned out for Carlos Sainz in France, when television showed the Ferrari strategists seemingly confused and indecisive.
Binotto admits that Ferrari can do better and that certain lessons have been learned, especially from the Monaco race, about the systems the team needs to adopt to make better decisions from the wall.
In any case, Binoto believes that trying to do better is not to believe that Ferrari has a fundamental problem with its strategy, because he claims that there are times when it has beaten its Red Bull rivals by doing a better job with the choices. of tires in the race.
“I think there are always ways to improve,” he told us in an exclusive interview with Motorsport.com, “you can’t be perfect, and you never will be perfect, but for sure, we have to improve aerodynamics, chassis, power unit, strategy. Or as much as we can.
“Having said that, I think I have a great strategy team and I don’t think it’s a weakness for us.”
Comparison with Hamilton in Abu Dhabi
Binotto commented that it is important, when correctly evaluating decisions regarding strategy, not to judge only on how things turned out in the past.
On the contrary, you have to see if it was a correct decision or not by looking at the information that was available to the team at that time.
In F1, there are often times when a decision looks wrong in hindsight, but totally right at the time, especially when teams can’t judge how each other will react to the decision made.
Ferrari’s decision to keep Leclerc on track during the safety car at the British GP is a case in point, as it is the same as the one Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton had to deal with at last year’s Abu Dhabi GP. .
When you lead a race with the pack right behind you, you can find yourself caught in a trap. If you go in and the others stay out, you fall behind, so you lose track position and then if they don’t make up the places, it looks like you’ve sacrificed the leader for nothing. If you stay out, those behind you come in to put on new tyres, so if you lose positions on the way to the checkered flag, it looks like you’ve made a mistake by not changing your tyres.
The scenario for Hamilton in Abu Dhabi and Leclerc in Silverstone, and the choices of both teams keeping their driver on the track, were identical and for Binotto, in the end, they were correct decisions , even if on both occasions it cost them victory.
Reflecting on these similar circumstances, Binotto explained that he thought “it was the right decision for Lewis [Hamilton] and I think maybe it’s still the best one.”
“From the outside, yes, Max won the championship. But Max would have always done the opposite [to Hamilton]. If he had been in the front [having stopped Hamilton] how would the race have ended? We don’t know.
“So if at Silverstone Charles had stopped and Lewis had been left out, how would the race have ended? I don’t know.
“So even if you look back, I don’t know what the answer is although, by the way, no one discussed their [Mercedes’] decision at the time.
“Everybody thinks that in some way they can discuss what we did at Silverstone.”
no weaknesses
When reflecting on the first races of the season, as he refers to before the Hungarian GP , Binotto said that even post-race analyzes of the decisions made did not reflect blunders.
“While you can see Monaco, Silverstone and Paul Ricard as problems, I don’t see it that way, because I think sometimes we make the right decisions,” he explained.
“I’m not convinced right now that what we did was wrong. I remain convinced that what we did was the right decision at the time. Unfortunate at times, but not wrong.”
“I think if you look at our strategy team, sometimes they do very good things, even better than everyone else’s.”
“We did the right strategy in Austria and the others didn’t. We had probably the best strategy in France until Charles made the mistake.”
“And I think it shows that we were very brave in France to put two medium games on the run when the others chose the hard ones. To do that you need not only to be strong, but also to be brave.”
“So overall, we have a good team and I don’t think it’s a weak point for us.”
