Ferrari Team Principal Mattia Binotto has vowed that the squad will learn from the procedural setback that left Charles Leclerc out in Q1 at the Monaco Grand Prix.
Leclerc set a benchmark time but was gradually shuffled down the order as the session progressed, with the track ramping up, but Ferrari kept the local favourite in the garage.
Leclerc was ultimately knocked out and will line up on the grid from 15th for his home grand prix, courtesy of a penalty for Alfa Romeo’s Antonio Giovinazzi.
“I think we’ve got the right people,” said Binotto.
“I think we’ve got the right procedures, but we need to improve our tools.
“And I think we are at least open to new opportunities of looking at what we did and how we may do that differently in the future.
“That is something we will address from the next race onwards, no doubt.
“It has been a misjudgement, a wrong evaluation of what we call the cut-off time.
“Cut-off time is the threshold by when we believed we are comfortable into the next session and the cut-off time is calculated real-time based on what we see on the track, based on the real-time sectors of all the competitors, on all the drivers.
“When the cut-off time is calculated, we normally add a margin on top of it and the margin is good enough to afford for any tolerances, uncertainty, whatever might happen during the session normally.
“Certainly what happened was the margin we applied was not sufficient, for very little, and the reasons are certainly two – the first is the track improvement has been very significant and important by the end of Q1, the second is that probably our margin did not considering enough variability due to drivers’ maybe confidence by driving through Monaco.
“Certainly in Monaco, that margin needs to be increased in future no doubt. It’s not sufficient to calculate a cut-off time, to apply a margin.
“But in Monaco, lesson learned is that the margin needs to be simply bigger. As simple as that.”
Binotto added that Leclerc’s early exit was partly attributable to Ferrari needing to take bigger risks than its rivals due to its position in the championship.
“We may argue that as Ferrari, it’s a mistake that should not happen,” he said.
“As Ferrari, we are facing a situation where we need to catch up points in the championship, we need to catch up compared to our competitors, and when you need to catch up you need to take some risks as well.
“By taking margin on everything we are doing, taking margin would mean to use a second set of tyres, to miss a set of tyres for Q2 and Q3.”
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