Ferrari sees themselves as third fastest team good result in Spain
With a fourth and seventh place, Ferrari achieved their best result since Turkey last year. Also in qualifying, Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz (fourth and sixth) did well and the Italian team seems to find the way up.
Pleased with progression
With 60 points Ferrari is now only five points behind McLaren and it looks like the team can seriously fight for third place in the championship. Ferrari team boss Mattia Binotto is therefore very happy with this step forward. "We have made a lot of progress and that is good to see", Binotto tells Racer.com. "The team has shown that they know they are capable of addressing the weak points."
Despite the progression, the connection with Mercedes and Red Bull Racing is still far away. "It will take time to become even stronger, but I think this team is great and capable of achieving a lot. Above expectations is not the right description, but I am quite satisfied. I think it's a great result compared to where we were last year."
Third fastest car
Binotto believes that Ferrari has the third fastest car on the grid this season, but has not been able to show this in all races. According to the Italian, this was mainly due to problems with the tyres. "I think here [in Barcelona] we were at least focused on that aspect and we handled it well. It's good to see that in the race we had this pace."
The Ferraris lack power, both in terms of maximum values and availability during the race. The Barcelona circuit rewards the best single-seaters, and in the last sector, the slow one and with the changes of directions, they were the best, this suggests that their car is not bad (their 2021 best chance is Monaco). However, they are slower than Mercedes by one second per lap, and seven tenths from Red Bull, because of PU. McLaren, which has the Mercedes PU and two very strong drivers, can give Ferrari big headaches.
