2023-09-22 20:18:26
Two podium opportunities have turned into a third place and a victory. That is Ferrari’s balance in the last race in Europe and the first of the Asian round, with Carlos Sainz as the clear protagonist of both cases. The Madrid native has achieved ‘2’, a long-awaited victory in which he also demonstrated a character that is beyond doubt and which confirms him as a leader where Ferrari most expected him.
It’s not easy to fight in a season where there is clearly a dominator who is crushing like this. Max Verstappen, Red Bull and the (false) freelancer Adrian Newey have managed to beat their rivals with lethal authority. Things would have to change a lot, not for Verstappen to win the title sooner rather than later, which is what everyone was counting on, but also for the team itself to do its thing. On Sunday, by adding one more point than Mercedes, they will be proclaimed constructors’ champions.
Ferrari has not only been harmed by Red Bull, but because they themselves got into a very complex loop. The very idiosyncrasies of the Italian squad made them lose podiums that had been claimed, fights for a pole that they could have conquered, and above all a performance in the race that did not make the tifosi feel ashamed. Seeing a race in which the pits, the strategy and the drivers themselves acted in minimal conditions that did not cause embarrassment was like seeing a unicorn. The work of team management is something that was conspicuous by his absence, and that left the Italian fans with very little desire to continue seeing their idols.
But everything changed and what better place than Monza. Sainz, and not ‘Il predestinato’ Leclerc, pulled a Scuderia that needed a joy or, at least, a reasonably quiet weekend from the well of results.
The rise of Ferrari
Ferrari’s work to evolve its car to try to hold on to the second or third place on the podium came at the same time that one of the main rivals, Aston Martin, fell. Fernando Alonso began the campaign with five of six possible podiums, and the hope of seeing the ’33’ faded as the ‘2’ began to be an increasingly real possibility.
It is not something that, given what we have seen, can surprise anyone. Aston Martin’s capacity for evolution is almost nil, as it already demonstrated in the times of Force India and Racing Point before. Although the AMR23 was born as a more than drinkable car, and even potentially a winner, Aston Martin’s intrinsic shortcomings for its evolutions have made it fall from the shortlist of potential winners. And when that gap was left, others began to believe.
Both Mercedes and Ferrari knew how to fill that gap and that is where Sainz has taken a step forward. At Monza but especially in Singapore, he knew how and where to command, and even contradict his team if he believed he should do so. Everything that was in his power was done, and from there he achieved one of his two victories in Formula 1 and, possibly, one of his best (perhaps his best) weekend in the competition.
For Japan it will be time to row. Barring maximum surprise, it will be Verstappen who conquers the Suzuka circuit, barring a radical change in the weather (predictions do not indicate this) or perhaps an unexpected turn of events. But the change in attitude of his rivals is already very notable. This Friday, Sainz said that “some interesting days” awaited them, smiling and satisfied to see himself in the ‘top 4’ of the free practice sessions before qualifying and aware that he still had something in store. Everything suggests that it will be a reasonably calm race for the Red Bull leader, but behind him there will be a pack in search of him. And there Sainz (and Alonso?) will be very present.
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