At the French Grand Prix, radio messages between Ferrari and its drivers caused confusion and made the Italian team look bad. Several members of the team have revealed the manipulation.
Last Sunday at Paul Ricard it was once again clear that Formula 1 uses the radio messages from teams at your convenienceand not always with the healthy intention of rigorously informing the viewer.
It is not something new, but in France Ferrari suffered this situation on two occasions: the first with the accident of Charles Leclerc and the second with the last pit stop of Carlos Sainz.
“We saw that Carlos couldn’t pass Checo on the opposite straight and at turn 10 we decided to call him into the pits”
Regarding the first situation, Charles Leclerc and Mattia Binotto explained that it was not true that there had been a fault in the throttle of the Ferrari F1-75 number 16, causing the accident as a result.
This theory originated when Formula 1 punctured Charles Leclerc’s radio during the repetition of the Monegasque’s track exit. A conversation in which he informed his engineer that he could not accelerate, followed by a cry of despair.
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A week earlier, Leclerc himself had had to finish the race in Austria with throttle problems, which kept the engine partially revving under braking.
The theory was immediately spread that Leclerc had left after suffering the same problem, when the reality was that when engaging the reverse gear to return to the track the car did not allow him to accelerate.
The second stop of Carlos Sainz
Later in the race, Carlos Sainz was torn between trying to get a podium finish by staying on track but risking a tire blowout, or pitting a second time and securing fifth place.
“After the safety car we were the only car with medium compound, while all our rivals had hard tyres,” he explains. Inaki Rueda regarding this situation.
“So we had an advantage over our rivals and we would have had it for the first 20 laps, where the medium tire would have been better, but it would have cost us to get to the end. Also, the drivers with hard tires would have been faster than us in the final phase of the stint»expands the Spanish engineer, head of strategy at Ferrari.
«The expected duration for the tires was 25 laps, while the stint after the SC lasted 35, so we would have missed 10 laps. In these cases, when a driver exceeds the expected duration of the tire, he has to take care of the tire and drive very slowly. Otherwise, there is a risk of tire failure », he explains.
“The 5 second penalty changed our approach from the last stintbecause even if Carlos had managed to pass Russell and Pérez, he would never have managed to open a gap of 5 seconds running on medium tires until the end of the race.
“Aware of this situation, We decided to stop Carlos and make sure he got back on track to get the fastest lap point.”points out Iñaki Rueda.
But this situation was understood as a deep confusion in the television broadcast, since the performance first punctured a conversation in which Carlos Sainz admitted that he could not overtake Sergio Pérez, assuming that they would have to make a second stop.
Next, Sainz sees an opportunity and tries to overtake Pérez, which lasts several corners. Just as the Spaniard passes the pit entrance heading into the last corner -While fighting for position with the Mexican-, this conversation takes place:
- Sainz Engineer: «Box, Carlos, Box. Please confirm”.
- Carlos Sainz: “Not now, not now!”
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Immediately everyone understood that the engineer was asking Sainz to pit. when the entrance had already been passed and in the middle of the fight with Pérez. However, that had not been the actual situation.
“You have to remember that the radios of the teams that are broadcast on television always have a delay with respect to what happens on the track”, points out Iñaki Rueda. “Carlos and Pérez clashed on lap 41. We saw that Carlos couldn’t pass Checo on the opposite straight and at turn 10 we decided to call him into the pits.”
“Obviously, he was in a fight with Pérez and thought he would have to pit on the next lap, that’s why he said it on the radio,” Rueda expands. «Following the race on television, the radio message was broadcast near turn 15, just after the pit lane entranceand there would have been no point in making such a late call.”
In other words, the conversation had taken place five curves before the broadcast on television, which undoubtedly changes the perception of it a lot. Anyway, all for the show.
Font: motorsport.com
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Photos: Scuderia Ferrari