(Motorsport-Total.com) – After a promising start to the race weekend for the Hungarian Grand Prix, Ferrari could not meet the high expectations. Charles Leclerc speaks of a “disappointing weekend” after finishing fourth, while team principal Frederic Vasseur primarily criticizes the weak race execution.
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Sky expert Ralf Schumacher is also surprised by the Scuderia’s drop in performance. The decline compared to Friday, in particular, puzzles him: “That is actually a big disappointment,” Schumacher says on Sky Germany. “On Friday, they were still half a second faster than the rest of the world and somehow failed to maintain or build on that. Everyone else developed further.”
Schumacher also criticized the team’s strategy: “In addition, Fred Vasseur brought Lewis in at the wrong time. On track, Ferrari lost another position because of this. That was a bit of a shame. I think you can read about that in Italy tomorrow as well.”
Leclerc: “A disappointing weekend”
Leclerc also makes no secret of his disappointment after the race: “Definitely not. It was a disappointing weekend,” says the Monegasque. Particularly puzzling for him is the almost unpredictable form curve of the past races: “Of the last three races, there were two where we expected to have problems, and we finished first and second. The race where we thought we would be strong, we finished in fourth and fifth places.”
For Leclerc, this is no coincidence: “Both cars show the same tendency. We are strong on weekends where we actually expect difficulties, and we struggle precisely when we believe we are competitive. We need to understand that.”
At the same time, he points to the failed start, which decisively influenced the further course of the race: “With a good start, the race could have looked completely different. On a track like this, there are only a few overtaking opportunities.”
Tire choice was right from Leclerc’s perspective
At the start, Leclerc opted for the soft tires, even though only already used softs were available to him after the difficult qualifying. “I wanted to use the advantage of the soft tire at the start,” he explains after the Grand Prix. “We believed that was the right tire. And I think the race showed that we were right. Many drivers also switched to the soft later. I don’t think the medium was particularly good today.”
Nevertheless, Ferrari was never consistently convincing in the race. “We paid the price for the start. The first stint on the hard tires wasn’t bad, the last one on the softs was pretty good. But overall, there were too many fluctuations. That’s exactly what we need to work on,” Leclerc continued.
The Monegasque also admits that the SF-26 is currently difficult to assess: “We need to find more consistency with this car. Some stints were difficult for Lewis, others for me. It’s a bit strange how little the different impressions match up.”
Ferrari searches for the causes
Leclerc also admitted to Sky Germany that Ferrari had apparently misjudged the track conditions. “It’s a combination of different factors,” he said.
“I haven’t seen the data yet, but I felt like I did roughly what I wanted to do. However, we tuned the car to a certain grip level. In fact, there was probably significantly less grip than expected. As a result, I had a lot of wheelspin, and that was very difficult to control,” Leclerc continued.
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The fact that Ferrari has recently fallen short of its own expectations on technical tracks also worries the Monegasque. “I believe Mercedes runs with quite conservative engine programs on Friday. On Saturday, we were no longer at Friday’s level,” he explains.
“Everyone expects us to be particularly strong on such technical tracks. But whether in Budapest or Monaco, we weren’t where we expected to be. We need to understand what we’re doing wrong on these tracks, because for some reason it’s not working,” Leclerc continued.
Vasseur: “Everything went wrong on Sunday”
Team principal Vasseur primarily blamed the numerous errors in the race for the disappointing result.
“If you are first and second on Friday, you expect significantly more than fourth and fifth places,” says the Frenchman soberly. “We made too many mistakes on Sunday. Starting with the start, then the penalty, then Max overtook us on track. At almost every pit stop, we lost a position due to two or three tenths of a second. After that, you spend the whole race behind other cars.”
However, the true race pace was difficult to assess, Vasseur admits. “Lando was extremely fast today, significantly faster than Oscar. Behind Oscar, we were probably a bit faster. But with these cars, it’s very difficult to judge how fast you really are when you’re not in clear air.”
Strategy right despite setback
The team principal also defended the strategy. After the bad start, Ferrari had to react early and attempt the undercut. “About 20 laps from the end, we realized from Max’s stint that the soft tire wasn’t bad at all. That’s why we opted for the soft, because we had the oldest set of hard tires in the field,” said Vasseur.
The team principal further explains the strategy: “After the bad start, we had to try something and attempt the undercut. This means you have to make your decisions earlier than the competition. If I had to decide again today, I would choose the soft again.”
However, the fact that Verstappen was ultimately able to complete around 37 laps on a set of soft tires surprised the team. “We had expected the tire to last perhaps only half as long. The hard tire was significantly more difficult than expected, but we only realized that very late. At that point, we could no longer react to the development. That probably surprised everyone,” says the Ferrari team principal.
For Ferrari, the analysis work thus begins during the summer break. The team from Maranello must find the causes for the recently highly fluctuating performances before the season enters its decisive phase.
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