“We are still the outsider, not the favourites”- Binotto disappointed even after Ferrari making waves during testing
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Scuderia Ferrari's Team Principal and Engineer Mattia Binotto
Scuderia Ferrari’s F1-75 challenger got a lot of positive reception from fans all over the world following its launch and also seemed to be a smooth and steady car during the course of pre-season testing at Barcelona with Monégasque Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc clocking in the fastest lap on Day Two of testing.
Leclerc’s Spaniard teammate Carlos Sainz seemed to have a pretty smooth time with the F1-75 during testing which is making Ferrari fans all over the world hopeful about the Italian-based racing team going back to winning ways after a really long time. Ferrari had ended up in the third position in the constructors’ championship for the 2021 Formula One season.
On being asked about gaining an advantage in the aero testing rules by Autosport, Ferrari’s Team Principal Mattia Binotto denied any said advantage they supposedly had over the other teams on the grid. “If you look at the amount, it’s a couple of sessions on the entire year, it’s maybe a tenth per lap if you are very good. And I think that’s the amount, and then it’s all how you manage priorities, how good you are, and how efficient in your activities,” added the Swiss-born team principal and engineer for Ferrari.
“If I look at Mercedes and Red Bull, how strong they were last year, no doubt that as teams they are very, very strong. And I think the regulations are in place to help the less efficient ones. Overall, I think as Ferrari it was important for us to try to put focus on priority on the 2022 car. We always said it was a good opportunity.”
Ferrari Team Principal Mattia Binotto puts forth his pointers from pre-season testing at Barcelona
Although Ferrari had a fairly good run during testing at Barcelona, Binotto still added that there’s much to learn about their F1-75 challenger. “It’s very early days,” he mentioned about his audit of the F1-75. “It’s always great to have consistency when running because it’s time to learn a new car. And when you’re doing a lot of laps, you are certainly collecting data.”
“Now we are on track, we try to learn the car. How we benefit from that I think only the next months will tell us, and not the next day. Before we see the potential, the full potential of these cars, I think it could take at least four to five races, because there is so much to learn, to adapt, to address. Even the first race will be a completely different situation in Bahrain, the heat, a completely different type of track,” added Binotto.
Talking about the car pace and design, Binotto said, “Honestly, I think we are not the strongest team. We are still the outsider, not the favorites. Overall, on the pace, I think it’s really, very early to judge. What I can see is that we are all very close, which was one of the objectives of the new regulations. I think it’s quite impressive to see that we are so close, straight from the start. And if you look at the cars, they are so different, which I think no one was expecting, so many differences between design and shapes. But again, when you look at the lap time, yes, certainly there will be differences, but it was not as huge as the difference in design.”
Binotto then shared a warm moment about his team still being as united as ever after facing a charade of difficulties in the past few years and that he’s exceptionally proud of his team to still push through and make the changes happen so as to achieve their vision as a racing team.
Also Read: “All we can do is wait and see,” Mattia Binotto on whether Russian GP will go ahead
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Rishika Saha
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