The Spanish Ferrari driver had to settle for a disappointing ninth position on a weekend in which he seemed ready to fight for pole. A red flag and a mechanical problem have affected him in Q3.
There is no doubt that Carlos Sainz He is deeply frustrated by the result of the third qualifying of the 2022 season, as the Spanish driver had finally managed to find the maximum potential of a Ferrari F1-75 with which in the previous two races he had not felt comfortable.
This changed at Albert Park, but a series of misfortunes have condemned him to ninth position on the grid, which in normal conditions rules him out of the fight for victory.
the red flag
It all started when Fernando Alonso suffered an accident which caused the red flag just as Carlos Sainz entered the finish straight to finish his first flying lap.
According to the regulations, any lap recorded after a red flag must be invalidated, so his time, which was similar to that of Charles Leclerc (poleman provisional at the time), was deleted.
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“The truth is that Q3 has been an absolute disaster”, Carlos Sainz lamented. First with the red flag, which did not allow us to set a lap at the beginning of the session that would have been a good time to get up there in front, it came out just when I was going to cross the finish line.
car won’t start
Carlos Sainz had one attempt left, but things also went wrong. a mechanical problem that prevented the Ferrari mechanics from starting the car at the scheduled time was resolved in time to allow the Madrid native to get out on the track, but it prevented him from carrying out his usual procedure of a preparation lap to bring the tires to their optimum temperature.
Already on the only flying lap he had time to do, and when he was in good enough time to join Leclerc and the Red Bulls in the top positions, lost control of the Ferrari at turn 10. Although he was able to recover it, he lost so much time that in the end he could only get ninth position on the grid, beating only an Alonso who had not set a time.
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«The car did not start, we had the tires ready to do a preparation lap and then pull, but we have not reacted quickly enough and we went out on the track late”, explained Sainz.
“I did the lap with the tire cold and without being able to warm it upthat’s why we are so far behind… I don’t know, we have to analyze it, because Q3 above all has been a disaster, “reiterated a frustrated Carlos Sainz.
difficult race
With this panorama, Carlos Sainz has no choice but to be aggressive in this Sunday’s race, as he must come back to minimize some damage for the championship that, unless unforeseen situations remedy it, will be inevitable.
“On top of that, they have removed the fourth DRS zone, which will be much more complicated”Sainz pointed out when thinking about the race. “Furthermore, this weekend it seems that all the cars are a little closer together, Red Bull and Ferrari don’t have the advantage of previous races, so it’s going to be a difficult day tomorrow, but I’ll try to come back as much as I can.”
Of course, Carlos Sainz does not believe that Ferrari has been more affected by the elimination of the fourth DRS zone, so the Madrid driver flees from excuses for the race. “It affects us all equally, it’s no excuse, it will affect overtaking,” he concluded.
Source:
DAZN F1