With the second win of the season in the third race at the latest, it is clear that Scuderia Ferrari has returned to the top of Formula 1 after years of defeats and disappointments. While Charles Leclerc prepared the next party for the traditional Italian racing team with his second win of the young season, teammate Carlos Sainz only played the role of well-wisher after his failure at the Australian Grand Prix.
The balance of power at Ferrari is clearly regulated after the race in Melbourne at the latest. While Leclerc is leading the drivers’ championship in Formula 1 by a large margin with an outstanding 71 points from three races, Sainz is in third place in this ranking. However, he is already a whopping 38 points behind.
Before the home game in Imola, Italy, which takes place after the Easter holidays on April 24, Leclerc has clearly put himself in the role of leader in the team.
Also the longtime Formula 1 driver and today’s “sky“Expert Timo Glock takes this view, stressing after the Melbourne race to the TV station: “Charles Leclerc is on an absolute high at the moment. Within the team, the fronts are relatively clearly regulated quite early on.”
For Glock, it was already clear after the third race of the season that “Ferrari Charles will give priority as soon as possible in certain situations. Of course not that extreme. But Leclerc is the world championship leader and Carlos Sainz is a certain amount behind him.”
Sainz falls early in Melbourne
The Spaniard dropped out early after an early driving error in Melbourne’s Albert Park and left Down Under with a bitter zero number. In the drivers’ standings, he still fell behind Mercedes competitor George Russell, who finished third on the podium for the first time in the new Silver Arrow.
In contrast to the victorious Ferrari team, the pecking order for the other two big teams is still surprisingly open at the moment. Both world champion Max Verstappen in the Red Bull and record champion Lewis Hamilton are behind their respective teammates after three races.
The 130-time F1 starter Glock is extremely pleased that the designers in Formula 1 have moved much closer together overall: “The path that Formula 1 is taking is the right one. Of course there will be routes where overtaking is still difficult. We saw that again here in Melbourne. But there were still overtaking maneuvers and this close pursuit also worked.”