Ferrari boss Frederic Vasseur has claimed that he’s not feeling “negative” about the team’s recent dip despite being behind its rivals in Formula 1’s Austrian Grand Prix.
Carlos Sainz put an end to Ferrari’s recent barren streak since winning in Monaco as he converted fourth place on the grid into a third-place finish at the Red Bull Ring.
However, the Spaniard was situated behind one Red Bull, McLaren and Mercedes until Max Verstappen and Lando Norris’ clash presented him with a podium opening.
Ferrari began the ongoing season as Red Bull’s closest challenger, but the Italian marque has since been unable to maintain that momentum in the development race.
However, Vasseur is not concerned with Ferrari’s sudden regression relative to the competition and is convinced the car is more competitive than it showed in Austria.
Asked about Sainz and team-mate Charles Leclerc’s contrasting view on Ferrari immediate issues, Vasseur retorted: “First, the word issue is a big one.
“We were speaking before the discussion about the situation yesterday that when we arrived on four, we were one-tenth and a half in advance on Norris.
“It means that if we close the lap, and I know perfectly that we have to close the lap, I think the perception of this is completely different.
“But for sure, as usual, and even when you do the pole position, and even when you win the race, you have issues on the car.
“If you don’t have issues, you are at the beginning of the end. But we changed massively the car between Saturday morning and Saturday afternoon.
“And I think it was better. We changed a little bit the weakness of the car from corner to corner, but I think overall we are there.
“I think it will be helpful for us to have FP1, FP2 in Silverstone, also if the weather is good, to do a sanity check on everything.
“But strangely, I’m not negative on the performance. Strangely, because we are in the race, we are far away from Max. But I had the feeling that we were able to get more today.”
Vasseur has argued that the perception surrounding Ferrari’s weekend would have changed had Charles Leclerc qualified without several errors on his last timed run.
But while he’s conceded that the team is now heading into rounds on the backfoot, the Frenchman has touted that the Maranello-based squad is working on solutions.
“Honestly, yes, if we finish the lap yesterday in quali, I think I will have the comments that, ‘you are back, you are fighting with Red Bull, you are at less than one-tenth off the pole position, blah, blah, blah,'” Vasseur contended.
“It’s just in any case, and I think you can take my quote of Monaco, I think I was saying exactly the same.
“It’s not after a good result or a bad result that we have to change the mindset or the team or whatever.
“We had good weekends, some weekends we were faster than everybody, some weekends we were at the level of Max, some weekends we were at a step-down.
“I think this weekend we started a step-down. But the reaction was good, and I think on Saturday morning we were in a much better shape. Saturday afternoon, sorry.
“No, no, we don’t want to change. I think Silverstone will be helpful for us.
“We have ideas into the pipe, we have upgrades to bring later on, but we won’t change the approach, and we will continue to push.”
Leclerc’s mistakes resigned him to seventh on the grid and a three-wide moment with Oscar Piastri and Sergio Perez at Turn 1 saw him incur immediate wing damage.
The Monegasque’s setback meant he was unable to haul his car back into the points as he trailed home in 11th, but Vasseur has backed him to rebound this weekend.
Asked whether there were regrets considering Leclerc could have seized a win had he qualified in a reflective place, Vasseur replied: “No, it’s the game that for sure.
“For sure at the end of the session you have regrets, because you say that ‘okay, if you push a little bit less, perhaps that you are not P2, you are P3, it’s better than P6’.
“For sure when you try to summarise the weekend, I think we can be frustrated with Charles, because we had the potential to do on Saturday morning, and even Friday evening, to do a much better weekend, and to score much more points, but it is like it is now, we have to sit down, to discuss together, to see what we can improve.
“And it’s one out of 24, and we will be back next week.”
