Ferrari explains the disqualification of Charles Lerclerc
For Diego Ioverno, the sporting director of Ferrari, the disqualification of Charles Leclerc had not been envisioned by the team but is explained by several factors specific to the Texas circuit in Austin.
Charles Leclerc was disqualified from the USA Grand Prix by the FIA race directors. The Monegasque’s single-seater violated the technical regulations, specifically article 3.5.9 e). The FIA thus discovered that several protective areas of the Ferrari’s floor were lower than what the regulations require by a few millimeters.
« The thickness of the floor assembly measured perpendicular to the lower surface (floor) must be 10 mm ± 0.2 mm and must be uniform when new. A minimum thickness of 9 mm will be accepted due to wear, and compliance with this provision will be checked at the edges of designated holes. » explains the regulation.
Holes are positioned on the floor to measure this thickness. If no figure has been specified, Diego Ioverno, Sporting Director of Ferrari, replacing Laurent Mekies, affirms that it is a matter of a few millimeters.
« The stewards’ decision was to disqualify Charles and Lewis for a technical rule violation. The regulations clearly state that at the end of the race, there are measurements to comply with on the underside of the chassis, used to protect the car from asphalt abrasion. » he explains.
« At the end of the race, our car was below the minimum by a few millimeters but enough to consider the car as illegal. The rules impose a disqualification in this case and I want to explain why this happened. »
A combo of bumpy track and lack of test time
Diego Ioverno states that the reasons that pushed Scuderia Ferrari to allow Charles Leclerc to drive so low are primarily linked to the lack of testing, in this sprint format of the USA Grand Prix.
« The Weekend Sprint is very special with really very little time to prepare for the race. Only one session and then you go into Parc Fermé. So you can’t change the settings afterwards. In addition to this, Austin is a great circuit but very bumpy. Bumpy tracks are complicated to apprehend. Many cars in the past have had suspension problems or chassis breaks. We knew it would be complicated and this is the reason why we raised the car a bit in practice. »
« From our point of view, it was Ok. »
The Ferrari has therefore been raised, but not enough. Ioverno explains several parameters that have accentuated the phenomenon of floor degradation more than imagined.
« The facts showed that it was not enough and the wind that changed here was difficult to judge and contributed to making our car illegal. »
« With the information we had in the trials, there is nothing more we could have done. If we had raised the car higher, we would have lost in performance and we are here to optimize performance as you can imagine. »
