Although he was able to save appearances in Q3 in Bahrain, Carlos Sainz also admitted to having experienced the most difficult weekend of his career with Ferrari at Sakhir. He notably targets his pure performance deficit, and his difficulty in being comfortable in the car, compared to his teammate Charles Leclerc.
Carlos Sainz knows that it is his settings that are wrong: but why? The Spaniard says he already has his own theories on the subject in Jeddah, ahead of free practice this weekend…
“In Bahrain I was in the fight for pole in qualifying and that was good news for me, given the lack of feeling I have with this car and the lack of understanding I have. »
“It was good news to still be able to do two very solid laps in qualifying which almost gave me pole. But the fact is that I still have to work on the settings, I have to work on understanding the car. »
“I did my analysis over those three days with my guys and we had some very interesting theories and some very interesting things to try out here. I don’t think it will be a one-race thing. Kind of like last year, right? Little by little, we have to move forward and get there. »
“But we also need more races. I don’t know if Bahrain was a bit of an exception, I don’t know if all of a sudden here in Saudi Arabia I’ll be back where I should be or where I expect to be. So, let’s see. It’s still a bit early. »
To keep his secrets on his side of the garage warm, Carlos Sainz does not want to go into the details of his theories… It is therefore impossible to know what is precisely wrong with his settings for the moment.
“It’s too specific and too technical to explain to the press. »
“There are things, like the feeling with the car, knowing exactly what to do in each type of corner to extract the maximum and then you have to put the car a little more to my liking, so that I am more comfortable with it, as I did in the second half of 2021. I want to try to do it as soon as possible. »
“I insist, it’s very technical. There are things that even I don’t understand yet. It’s not worth going into details, it’s only worth trying it, experimenting with it, and that’s what I’m going to do. »
“And if, with the car from Bahrain, I managed to be second, if I have the car to my liking, I am convinced that good times are ahead for me. »
Carlos Sainz’s difficulties might disappear, or worsen, who knows, this weekend on a very different track, in Jeddah. Does the Ferrari driver expect better, or even much better, on the shores of the Red Sea?
“The more time I spend in the car, the faster I’ll understand and the more likely I’ll be to tune the car a little more to my liking. »
“It will be an important test because it’s a circuit where you have to be really confident. And last year I was, so it will be an interesting comparison. You have to be confident to be fast and close to the walls here and Jeddah is going to show me and tell me how confident I am. »
