Vasseur is upset with the FIA after the penalty imposed on Sainz
Ferrari suffered a major setback in Australia with the retirement of Charles Leclerc and the five-second penalty on Carlos Sainz, which resulted in him finishing outside the top 10. The weekend was described as a "nightmare" by Fred Vasseur.
Fourth before the safety car intervention on lap seven, Carlos Sainz was one of those who took advantage of it to make a pit stop shortly before the first red flag was waved, canceling his advantage with the free tire change for all the other competitors.
Sainz still managed to climb from P11 to P4 before having contact with his compatriot Fernando Alonso. The race stewards then penalized the Ferrari driver by adding 5 seconds to his final race time, which dropped him out of the points, finishing only in 12th place.
A spoiled performance
Despite the early race spin-off of his teammate Charles Leclerc after a collision with Lance Stroll’s Aston Martin, the good pace of Sainz had, to some extent, counterbalanced this setback.
Carlos recovered very well after the unlucky pit stop just before the red flag, and getting penalized like that just before the end is very tough, summarizes Vasseur.
« It’s certain that you’re on edge in this kind of situation, because you’re not far from the podium. You’re P4 and you just came out of nowhere while all the others stop for free. »
He did a very good job and I think we can discuss the penalty for hours, whether it is severe or not. It is certain that depending on the team, the analysis will be different.
Vasseur recalls, with these words, Sainz’s long argumentation on his radio at the moment when he learns and doesn’t understand why he is given a 5-second penalty. This penalty did not change the final standings, except for those who did not retire, which was not the case for Alonso.
“For me, it’s very unfortunate,” the Frenchman continues.
Since it didn’t affect the podium, the stewards could have listened to Carlos and looked at the data. During the last Grand Prix, we changed the rules twice in ten minutes regarding Alonso’s pit stop. We could have done the same today, or at least discuss it.
Remember the positive
Despite a zero score, the French leading the Reds underline the promising performance of the SF-23 seen in Australia.
« There are positive points. If you look at the entire weekend, [on Saturday] we were disappointed with the result, but the level of performance was there, we just didn’t manage to put everything together. »
« But [Sunday], the pace was good. We had to make an extra pit stop, but I accept it, and the pace was good. It’s a step forward compared to Jeddah two weeks ago, and now we have to take another step forward for Baku. »
