Charles Leclerc says Ferrari were less concerned with performance at the start of testing today than they were a year ago.
[smr2020test]The team made a strong start to testing 12 months ago. Sebastian Vettel described their 2019 car as “very close to perfection” after the first day of testing. But the season began disappointingly, and the team failed to win a race before the summer break.
Leclerc, who took over from Vettel at short notice today when his team mate became unwell, said Ferrari changed its priorities for the first day of testing this year.
“It was a bit different,” he said. “I think last year we were a bit more on the performance side, this year we are taking it more step by step.”
Leclerc said the team’s main concern was “to get to know the car at its best” and “to see if the numbers we have in terms of simulations are similar to the numbers now we have on track, which are very important.
The change in focus was due to Ferrari’s disappointing performance at the start of last season, said Leclerc.
“Last year testing was was great but the first race was a bit less great,” he said. “And I think we’ve learned a few things on this.
“This year we decided to focus more on ourselves, trying to learn the car as much as possible in these first few days and then focus on performance a bit later on and we’ll see if that pays off.”
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[f1tv2020testc]
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Robbie (@robbie)
19th February 2020, 20:10
Lol ya I would hope for their sake this was not a performance day. Kidding of course…I think what CL has said was obvious by their placing today, and good for them for having a plan and trying something different than last year. I’m sure they’ll look ‘where they belong’ before long.
Srdjan Mandic (@srga91)
19th February 2020, 20:17
Ferrari were definitely not chasing performance today. Yes, Leclerc did a couple of laps with DRS open, but his fastest S1-time was still about 0.6 slower than Hamilton’s best.
In the afternoon Leclerc focused only on race runs with the C3-compound and high fuel, lapping in the high 1:21s.
Jockey Ewing
19th February 2020, 21:11
I like the red they found for this year. Although the halo would be better in plain or extra dark black or even glossy black than this carbon fiber looking.
Phylyp (@phylyp)
19th February 2020, 21:59
If they’re looking at race/stint pace and tyre performance, that is a reassuring and hopeful sign. They were good in qualy in 2019, so race-side performance is something to hone. (Of course, there’s also strategy and driver errors, but pre-season testing can’t really help there).
DB-C90 (@dbradock)
20th February 2020, 1:27
No real surprises here – I doubt we’ll see anyone’s true performance until late next week, if at all.
Probably the most heartening thing is that on the face of it, teams times seem much closer together than previous seasons testing although, given that it is testing only, this could just be an anomaly.
Ajaxn
20th February 2020, 6:49
Vettel was very shrud to take a ‘sicky’. Had he been the driver, the focus would have been on him as a failing driver, and not Ferrari’s under performing car.
Maisch (@maisch)
20th February 2020, 8:30
Having good correlation between simulation and testing is the key to win, or else you will struggle the whole season. For the sake of the season I really hope they get it right this time :)
Balue (@balue)
20th February 2020, 10:09
Still correlation issues, ouch..