Ferrari, it’s red alert. Too many ups and downs: after the summer it will already be time for 2024

Who knows if Ferrari will be of use to the English lesson they had on Sunday at Silverstone. The team principal Frederick Vasseur, appealing to his usual optimism, said that from certain days “there is something to learn”. However, it is difficult to see half the glass full in a race that saw Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz struggle from start to finish, slipping to ninth and tenth positions. The Safety Car, which came in due to the (Ferrari) engine that went up in flames on Magnussen’s Haas, favored the rivals who had not yet stopped at the pit stop. Further mockery. However, it would be an alibi to look for the reasons for the defeat in adverse circumstances. The reds lacked the speed, the pace to stay hooked to the train of McLarens and Red Bulls of the elusive Max Verstappen, who then took off.

future

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It was a reverse, compared to the good performances of Canada and Austria, who had the illusion of being ahead of a turning point. The old hint is back on the big corners at Silverstone. We have to resign ourselves to the fact that the Cavallino will still experience ups and downs in the rest of the season, now marked. Having married the Red Bull philosophy, with the aerodynamic developments introduced, is not enough to change the nature of a project with too many starting limits. But we will absolutely have to succeed on next year’s car, finding more load and balance, so after the summer break, with the return to the track at Zandvoort and Monza, all the efforts of the engineers will be diverted to the 2024 car. The SF-23 will be evolved in the second part of the season with the new parts now in production in Maranello and the planned developments, however the gaze will be directed forward, in search of effective solutions to be transferred to the red to come. Among other things, this exercise is also useful from the point of view of cost management according to the “budget cap”, optimizing investments. If anything, the doubts concern the fact that the team’s technical leaders have not changed and will not change along this journey. With the lack of a technical director who continues to constitute a worrying anomaly (the assault on Pierre Waché of Red Bull failed) and the absence of a managing director who could perhaps support Vasseur, giving continuity to the work in the factory.

circuits

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In the meantime, Leclerc and Sainz will have to resign themselves to other Sundays of passion. Ferrari are confident they can be competitive in Hungary, where they race in two weeks’ time, being a twisty circuit with no fast corners, while they should struggle more at Spa-Francorchamps. Similarly, Zandvoort should be a favorable track, unlike Monza. In Singapore, the reds should still be fine, while on the big corners of Suzuka it is to be expected not. And so on, until the end of the championship, with Austin, Las Vegas and Abu Dhabi as other possible positive stages for Ferrari. We will see. Certainly, the situation is not very dissimilar for the competitors Mercedes, Aston Martin and McLaren, who shone in turn, meeting in turn Sundays to forget like the red. The alternation of results is the constant of the championship, behind the Red Bull of the extraterrestrial Verstappen, who doesn’t race on planet Earth. The hierarchies between the second, third and fourth teams change according to the circuits and the innovations introduced on the cars. And so Ferrari, second in Austria with Leclerc, found itself at the bottom of the points zone the following Sunday… Furthermore, the strategy at Silverstone didn’t convince either, with a choice of tires (medium and hard) that were too conservative. The breakdown that forced Leclerc to miss a free practice session didn’t help predict the correct duration of the softs. But in some cases the “remote garage” in Maranello should make the difference, and it didn’t. Another lesson to think about.