Vasser: The decision to start on soft tires was not successful

In the sprint of the Qatar Grand Prix, only Carlos Sainz brought Ferrari points for sixth place. His teammate Charles Leclerc finished seventh, but was given a five-second penalty for repeatedly exceeding the track’s boundaries and dropped to twelfth in the final protocol. The team admitted that the decision to start on soft tires turned out to be a mistake.

Carlos Sainz (6th): “Very difficult sprint. We had no information about the performance of the tires over a long series of laps, so we decided to start on Soft and try to gain a few places back at the start, and then monitor tire wear as we adjusted the position defended.

I had a really good start and during the first few laps it looked like we could fight at the front. Unfortunately the tires started to granulate a lot compared to the Medium, so sixth place was the best I could get.

We received a lot of useful information for Sunday. And although a very difficult race awaits us, we will attack until the end to earn more points.”

Charles Leclerc (12th): “Interesting sprint. After qualifying and sprint qualifying I ran out of new Soft sets, so I started on the rolled-in tires. This only made monitoring the condition of the tires more difficult.

Medium tires performed well. We have extra sets of these tires compared to our competitors, which could give us an advantage in the race. If we manage to work carefully with the Soft tires, this compound will also be good – the race should be interesting.”

Frederik Vasseur, Team Boss: “First of all, our congratulations to Max Verstappen and Red Bull Racing for winning the individual title. As for our team, the decision to start on soft tires was not made.

Several safety car visits helped us – otherwise the result would have been even worse. In a way, we minimized losses and earned a few points. Now you can concentrate on Sunday’s race, where the most important points are up for grabs. Our goal is to perform better than in the sprint.

For all teams, the 19 laps of the sprint proved useful as they allowed them to gather important information and evaluate tire wear over a long period of time. We will use the information received on Sunday.”