Carlos Sainz feels Ferrari must continue to aim for the F1 title in 2023 despite disastrous start to the campaign
Carlos Sainz is not giving up hope on his or Ferrari's title hopes in 2023, despite the fact that they've started the season very much on the backfoot.
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Carlos Sainz
Ferrari have gotten off to a rather poor start in 2023. After struggling for almost the entirety of the 2022 season due to reliability issues and strategic errors, and then a lack of pace, this season hasn’t been any better. The start, at least, has been much worse. In the first three races, Charles Leclerc retired twice, once from a mechanical failure (Bahrain) and once from an incident (Australia). In Australia, after Carlos Sainz was penalized, the team scored 0 points!
Their prospects for the next couple of races, though, are at least a little better. In Azerbaijan, there will be no major upgrades, but they may perform better regardless of that. The big upgrades will come around Imola and Barcelona, and perhaps some in Miami as well. But it’s hard to say if this will turn them into title contenders immediately, considering they are 103 points behind Red Bull at this stage. It’s more likely to help them in the fight with Mercedes and Aston Martin.
It’s beginning to look difficult that they will win a title in 2023, but Ferrari are not going to lose hope, at least of race wins. For Sainz, at least, it is still the goal this season. In a conversation with the Spanish television channel, Antena 3, he affirmed: “Yes, I think we can’t get that [the title] out of our minds. Even after a difficult start to the season, Ferrari’s objective still has to be to win.” as per GPBlog.
He continued: “We have everything in the factory working to try to bring improvements. The car at the beginning of the year has not fulfilled the expectations we all had, which was to fight to win races from the beginning and to fight for the world championship. At the moment Red Bull is running away, they are way ahead. But we don’t lose hope or desire and with that mentality we can and will improve.”
Carlos Sainz: ‘Second win could come at any moment’
Carlos Sainz doesn’t rate his chances of a second win particularly highly, but he still hopes and believes in them. In the same interview, he did say that his compatriot, Fernando Alonso, currently has a better chance of winning a race than him. Despite that, he does feel more comfortable with the machinery this year. He said: “In terms of feeling with the car and the first races I have been more comfortable than last year,”
He added: “I’m having better races than last year, but in the end Formula 1 depends a lot on the machine. This year it looks like Red Bull is dominating, Aston Martin is also a step ahead, and then Mercedes and we are there trying to improve what we have to see if we can get back on the podium and win. That second win I think could come at any moment, but it’s also true that we’re a little bit short. We need Red Bull to fail and we need to take a small step to also beat Aston Martin and Mercedes.”
It’ll be interesting to see if Sainz can add to his tally of wins this year. Right now, it looks unlikely, but this may change in the coming races. Fans will be hoping that the upgrades are enough to at least propel Ferrari into contention for race wins, and Sainz will hope the same.
In case you missed it:
- ‘We expected much more,’ Carlos Sainz rues Ferrari’s dismal start to the 2023 F1 season
- Carlos Sainz lashes out at “invented rumors” of him joining Audi in 2026
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Aniket Tripathi
(1002 Articles Published)