Why Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz didn’t also finish in the top 3 at Monza and how the Pirelli tires miraculously “healed” themselves
Ferrari won the Italian Grand Prix in Monza, but Ferrari “only” finished fourth in the same race. While Charles Leclerc crossed the finish line first, Carlos Sainz was a good 15 seconds behind him in first position after the podium places. But why actually?
Sainz himself says: “Actually, this race was all about who could best adapt the strategy to the conditions. We got it right with one car.”
Leclerc stopped on lap 15 and switched from medium to hard. “But we stayed out maybe five or six laps too long, and that cost me six or seven seconds on the mediums with graining,” says Sainz.
In fact, he also came in for a service just four laps after Leclerc, but lost an additional tenth of a second on the front runners in the pit lane – and then lost touch with the group in front.
“The slipstream is crucial here. When the McLaren pitted around lap 15, I didn’t have the slipstream. That’s when I realized how slow you are without slipstreaming. Then a train of three cars formed and I was stuck in the middle of nowhere with Lewis [Hamilton] behind me,” explains Sainz.
Expressed in figures: Where he was within three seconds of the car in front of him before the stop, there was a gap of more than nine seconds after the tire change
Was Sainz not aggressive enough?
Did Sainz take it too easy in this phase? He himself admits to having speculated a lot in this part of the race: “We just thought that the people who had already gone in around lap 15 would go for two stops.” And Ferrari itself was also considering what would be the better strategy.
Team Principal Frederic Vasseur does not find this reprehensible: “If you think about one stop on some laps and two stops on others, then sometimes you push less, sometimes more. Perhaps Carlos was more inclined to make one stop and therefore unconsciously pushed a little less. It’s a driver thing, whether you feel you’re pushing the tires too hard. “
In fact, Sainz felt restricted by the Pirelli tires. Although the wear with Hard in the second stint was “not so enormous”, Sainz emphasized that the Ferrari tires were “almost gone” by the time the competition turned off for the second stop.
Sainz and Leclerc suddenly had to contend with severe graining again, this time on the hard compound: the tread of the tire began to disintegrate. “We were really in a crisis then,” says Sainz. “Get in or stay out: It was like flipping a coin. “
Risky strategy at Ferrari with just one stop
Ferrari opted for the risky strategy without another pit stop and was rewarded for this risk: “Charles and the team managed it perfectly,” says Sainz. The key to this was the Pirelli tires, which “miraculously recovered”. “That’s why we were able to drive through with them, and even with decent pace.”
And at times it looked like the big sensation, because Ferrari had a one-two lead. But then Sainz in P2 came under increasing pressure from Oscar Piastri in the McLaren. “I did my best to slow him down for a lap. But he was one and a half seconds faster at that point. There’s not much more you can do at Monza than hold him off for one lap.”
Three laps later, Lando Norris in the second McLaren was also past. And with that, the podium was gone for Sainz, who nevertheless raved about his last Monza weekend in red: “It was incredible! I really enjoyed it. It was very nice to see the team win. It’s just a shame that I wasn’t on the podium. But Charles deserved to win, more than anyone else.”
It was also “great” that Ferrari was able to fight with McLaren. “On the other hand, Monza is exceptional. That’s why we have to wait and see how our update proves itself on other tracks and whether it heralds a turnaround,” says Sainz. “Whether we can fight for victories with it in the future or whether it will be more like Zandvoort again. “