‘Frustrated’ Ferrari F1 Team Facing Prospects of a Lost Season

• Ferrari came into the 2023 Formula 1 season with hopes of competing for the championship.
• The team has scored only a single podium, courtesy of Charles Leclerc in Azerbaijan, and is a lowly fourth in the Constructors’ Championship behind Red Bull, Mercedes and Aston Martin.
  
• Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz is confident that Ferrari will eventually find a remedy for its woes.

Ferrari is “trying everything” to remedy the faults of its SF-23 as it tries to salvage its struggling 2023 Formula 1 season.

Ferrari harbored hopes of contending for this year’s championship, but its hopes are already over after the opening seven races of 2023. It has scored only a single podium, courtesy of Charles Leclerc in Azerbaijan, and is a lowly fourth in the Constructors’ Championship behind Red Bull, Mercedes and Aston Martin heading into Sunday’s Canadian Grand Prix.

Ferrari introduced a heavily upgraded SF-23 at the previous race, in Spain, as it sought to address inconsistencies in the car’s handling as well as poor race pace. But its struggles continued as Leclerc was eliminated in Q1, and finished outside of the points in the race, while Carlos Sainz finished the race in an uninspiring fifth, 45 seconds off the lead.

“Overall, I think all the team is not satisfied with the performance we are showing on track and it is very far off our expectations at the beginning of the season,” said Leclerc on Thursday in Montreal. “We are very clear with ourselves and this is very clear to us.

“We need to understand these things and for now we don’t have the reason, which is a little bit more worrying. That’s where we need to push, to understand the reason of it, because obviously the feeling was really bad.”

Sainz reiterated that Ferrari is confident that it will eventually find a remedy for its woes. Anything learned this year will prove beneficial for next season considering the regulatory stability.

“The analysis is we just lack race pace at the moment and we need to make a car that is kinder on tires, but also more consistent with the aero and allows us to stay a bit more on the limit of the car during the whole race,” he said.

“We’re doing the best, every weekend we’re trying different things, we have new ideas, new bits on the car, every weekend we try something with tyres, if it’s not with tyres it’s with suspension, aero, we cannot fault the fact we are trying everything and I’m sure we’ll get to the bottom of it.”

Sainz conceded that “we are all frustrated” at the situation but asserted that lessons learned from its upgraded car will drive Ferrari in the right direction.

“It was a new opening in our window of development, and if this window doesn’t work we’ll open another one and another one and we’ll keep trying,” he said.

“I see good things coming and good spirits, it’s just at the race track the results are still not coming. We are all frustrated but also motivated to change.”