Carlos Sainz Jnr admits he is growing increasingly tired of the problems which he says have compromised five of his seven races so far this year.
The McLaren driver’s season hit a nadir at the last round in Spa-Francorchamps, which he was unable to start after a pre-race power unit problem caused a major exhaust failure.He has also suffered problems in pit stops and, at one stage, a loss of straight-line performance as a cooling problem on his previous engine forced McLaren to run less efficiency bodywork on his car.
“I think there’s definitely things we can do better and we are doing better already,” said Sainz. “Like, for example, I had three very slow pit stops in the first four or five races and it looks like we are improving that.
“So that is something that the team has been working very hard and the mechanics and everyone have been a much better job over the last two or three races. But obviously I got the bad luck of being affected by them.
“But on the other hand, [there was] this power unit issue here in Spa and a couple more power unit issues that I had before Spa that were holding me back a bit, which have definitely been quite unfortunate. It looks like everything has happened to me in these first seven races.”
Sainz admitted the persistent setbacks have caused him some frustration. “it’s starting to get a bit difficult to digest,” he said.
“Last year I got a run of two to three races with bad luck or with results not going [my] way. Which, as long as it is not your fault, you can digest pretty quickly. But this year, seven races, there’s little actually that has gone right apart from, I think, the first race in Austria and Barcelona.
“All the other races I’ve had an issue, I had a problem and I’ve lost out on at least 30 points this year in the championship which starts to hurt quite a lot. It starts to honestly affect me and I’m getting a bit upset by it. But at least it hasn’t been my fault. I just need to keep digging and need to keep working the same way.”
The power unit which caused last week’s failure will be used in Sainz’s car again tomorrow.
“We know the power unit is alive at the moment and I’m going to run it tomorrow,” he said. “Let’s hope it runs safely and nothing happens and we can start there with the same engine that I’ve been racing the last couple of weekends.”
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Chaitanya
3rd September 2020, 17:02
With those lost points(bad luck) he would be close to his teammate and team would be clear in 3rd place.
tony mansell
3rd September 2020, 17:03
It ok when you get to Ferrari you wont lose any points
nickthegreek (@nickthegreek)
4th September 2020, 7:54
hahaha! that’s mean!
Dan Rooke (@geekzilla9000)
4th September 2020, 9:38
OOF!!!
Harsh – but amused me!
DAllein (@)
3rd September 2020, 17:04
He shouldn’t be.
Did he check McLaren’s history in the last 20 years?
Did he see they got 0 (zero) Constructor Championships (and only a single championship courtesy of the best driver)?
Id didn’t give him even a slightest clue?
DAllein (@)
3rd September 2020, 17:05
At least he joins Ferrari, who didn’t have any championships for only 12 years…
Oh, dear!
Esploratore (@esploratore)
4th September 2020, 0:22
In recent times it’s become more of a formula where you either are on the top team or there’s no chance on titles (almost).
If we go back to the 90s, at first you had chances on ferrari, mclaren and williams, then only williams for 92 and 93, williams and benetton the next 2 years, williams the next 2, mclaren 98, mclaren and ferrari the next 2 years, ferrari the next 2, ferrari, mclaren, williams in 2003, ferrari 2004, mclaren and renault 2005, renault and ferrari 2006, ferrari and mclaren 2007-2008, red bull and brawn 2009, red bull 2010-2013, mercedes pretty much 2014 to now with the exception in 2018 where it could’ve been ferrari too, it seems there’s a lot less choice lately when it comes to the amount of seats where you can fight for a title.
Invisiblekid (@invisiblekid)
3rd September 2020, 17:40
You’re going to be really upset in 2021 then.
Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
3rd September 2020, 19:05
I don’t think Ferrari are going to be worse than they are now next year. Even Williams have made a clear step this year so I think it is incredibly unlikely that Ferrari won’t be at least reasonable next year. It likely will be the case that it won’t seem like much of a step up from McLaren though. We can’t know for certain though.
Drivers have made some pretty unlucky moves in the past. Alonso going from a rather poor Ferrari to Mclaren which looked decent that year – to then find out McLaren had become simply terrible when paired with the Honda engine. Also having to cope with the fact that 2015 was clearly very strong for Ferrari and he likely will have been frustrated to watch Vettel replace him and do so well.
Not that many will remember or sympathise with maldonado for this move, but I think it has to be the most unlucky switch made in the hybrid era. From being in Williams in 2013 which was simply awful looking at a team (Lotus) that was constantly challenging for podiums when with Grosjean at the wheel. To then going to a promising Lotus team and leaving behind the struggling Willaims. Then the teams literally swap places pretty much in terms of the ability of their car in the rankings. The 2014 Williams that he’d left for Lotus was easily the 3rd best team that year – at times 2nd best. And lotus were only better than the Caterhams and Marussias only ever picking up points if there was chaos behind. That was an incredibly unfortunate move.
Bad luck sometimes happens. But Ferrari are currently aware of their slump and I expect they will be a fair bit better next year.
TFLB (@tflb)
3rd September 2020, 20:07
Well, he’s right – if it hadn’t been for the slow stops etc he’d have been ahead of Norris in every race since the opening round. With that and signing for Ferrari… it hasn’t been the luckiest few months for Carlos.
Balue (@balue)
4th September 2020, 18:24
Bad luck and Sainz seems to have been close from the beginning, but maybe it’s just my impression.