Ferrari needs a hard restart after the Chinese Grand Prix disaster puts the team in a difficult situation | Giles Richards
Before the Formula One season began Lewis Hamilton had taken his motorhome to Ferrari’s Maranello factory, living alongside his new colleagues in order to bond with them and better learn their methodologies in an effort to make his transition into the Scuderia as seamless as possible. After he and his teammate, Charles Leclerc, were disqualified from the Chinese Grand Prix on Sunday, he may have to consider taking up residence again, as a rocked Ferrari deal with a disheartening opening to the season.
Both teams offered mitigation at the time. That the track was bumpy, that it being a sprint weekend minimised the time they had to set up the car. China, too, was a sprint weekend but no other team suffered excessive wear, while the track, just resurfaced, was praised for its smoothness, making such a miscalculation even more egregious.
It may as much have been the result of a team pushing every margin. “We have to be at the limit on every single item of the car,” the team principal, Fred Vasseur, told the Race last year. “We have to be aggressive and it’s a challenge to be at the limit of the weight, to be at the limit of the plank, to be at the limit of the cooling, to be at the limit of the fuel. It’s a challenge because in the end you are taking more and more risk.”
Both teams offered mitigation at the time. That the track was bumpy, that it being a sprint weekend minimised the time they had to set up the car. China, too, was a sprint weekend but no other team suffered excessive wear, while the track, just resurfaced, was praised for its smoothness, making such a miscalculation even more egregious.
It may as much have been the result of a team pushing every margin. “We have to be at the limit on every single item of the car,” the team principal, Fred Vasseur, told the Race last year. “We have to be aggressive and it’s a challenge to be at the limit of the weight, to be at the limit of the plank, to be at the limit of the cooling, to be at the limit of the fuel. It’s a challenge because in the end you are taking more and more risk.”
Ferrari have never endured a double disqualification before in the 75 years they have participated in F1, an embarrassment for which they held up their hands. They conceded that the skid block on the floor of Hamilton’s car had been worn 0.5mm below the limit, while Leclerc’s ride was 1kg below the minimum weight requirement. The F1 governing body, the FIA, said Ferrari acknowledged a “genuine error” and the team said it was a “mistake” they would endeavour not to repeat.
What made the events even more striking was the extraordinary turnaround they represented; that what had started so well could come clattering down about their ears with such calamity. Hamilton had taken pole and the win in the sprint race on Saturday with absolute elation at his first success with the team. Finally, here was the Ferrari that had been expected this season, a competitive car mixing at the very front.
Twenty-four hours later, the picture had changed drastically. Ferrari made changes to the set-up of the car before the race, which Hamilton said he believed were a mistake. It is hard to argue.
After a strong sprint, Hamilton and Leclerc qualified fifth and sixth and the race did not improve from there. Hamilton struggled for pace almost from the off, to the extent he offered to move over for Leclerc and duly let his teammate through. New tyres made no appreciable difference to Hamilton’s pace and the pair never came within a sniff of the leaders.
The disqualification three hours later brought the curtain down with bleak finality. It cost the team 18 points. They are 61 behind the leaders, McLaren, after only two meetings and, almost unthinkably, equal with Williams. Ferrari called it a misjudgment. It is the sort of misjudgment they can ill afford if they intend on challenging for a title any time soon. Nor should it be one they take easily, not least because we have been here before.
It may as much have been the result of a team pushing every margin. “We have to be at the limit on every single item of the car,” the team principal, Fred Vasseur, told the Race last year. “We have to be aggressive and it’s a challenge to be at the limit of the weight, to be at the limit of the plank, to be at the limit of the cooling, to be at the limit of the fuel. It’s a challenge because in the end you are taking more and more risk.”
