Charles Leclerc will take his first grid penalty for a power unit part change at the second round of the season in Saudi Arabia.
The Ferrari driver will use his second complete power unit of the year in Jeddah, and move onto his third set of control electronics, the annual limit for which is two. Switching to his third incurs an automatic 10-place grid penalty.The season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix weekend did not go to plan for Leclerc, as he had to replace the energy store and control electronics prior to the race on Sunday. Despite that during the grand prix he suffered another technical failure which meant he had to retire.
It left Ferrari in a position where it was most likely needing to install another control electronic unit in the car for Jeddah if either of the first two could not be repaired for use again.
Ferrari made reliability improvements to their power units during the off-season after running their motors at lower power during 2022 to reduce the risk of failures following a spate of retirements. The engines are used by Alfa Romeo and Haas in addition to the factory Ferrari team.
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2023 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix
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Retired (@jeff1s)
15th March 2023, 16:35
It’s not even round 2
Todfod (@todfod)
16th March 2023, 7:07
It’s Ferrari
Mayrton
16th March 2023, 10:03
Are these penalties still needed? I thought it was mainly to prevent Mercedes putting a fresh rocket in the car every session during the previous regulatory period.
melanos
19th March 2023, 11:17
I agree, with the cost cap rules in place it doesn’t make much sense, it is only compounding the misfortune.
Tifoso1989 (@tifoso1989)
15th March 2023, 16:43
This matches with what has been reported that the failure was due to a faulty wiring that caused vibrations which affected the CE and triggered the PU failsafe mode. The thing is this issue alone has cost the the team 2 CE and 1 ES in the first race alone. Leclerc will likely get 2 other penalties since he is expected to replace the CE and ES at least one more time. Moreover, Ferrari has already planned to tackle the season with 4 PUs and take an additional strategic penalty.
Not to mention the wobbly rear wing, the bodywork that failed from Leclerc’s car in Q1 and the nose deflection issue in testing. This is not acceptable. All the support to Benedetto Vigna with regard to the clean-up operation he is conducting, that Vasseur isn’t approving, to get rid of Binotto’s legacy.
It’s important to hold individuals accountable for their actions or lack thereof. By identifying and addressing any individual failures that contributed to the issues, the team may be able to improve accountability and prevent similar issues in the future.
G (@unklegsif)
15th March 2023, 16:51
This is the exact opposite of the Mercedes organisational culture, and while its all too easy and obvious to make the usual trope comment about 2022 and 23 season mistakes, 8 successive constructors and 7 successive drivers titles quickly dispels this
G
Tifoso1989 (@tifoso1989)
15th March 2023, 17:54
@unklegsif
G,
I don’t buy into anything coming from the Mercedes camp especially Toto Wolff who is the master of deflection and deception to the point that he become too predictable. Last year was the exception, this season and after one race it’s clearly that Wolff, Hamilton and Mercedes are running out of patience otherwise why bringing Allison back who has practically retired from F1 and was working on other Mercedes projects.
By bringing Allison back, Wolff is basically holding Mike Elliot and his team accountable and now they have to listen to whatever Allison will suggest. Besides, Mercedes or any other team including RBR are not Ferrari in the sense that they are under massive pressure to deliver every single time they go out racing. Ferrari is big boys school, anyone who wears the red shirt has to deliver.
ajaya
15th March 2023, 22:34
ferrari WAS big boys in the days of RB+JT +MS.
right now its just a team that cant even get their strategies straight. they still seem to think like they are living in the glory days.. about time to take away their veto
RBR and merc approach of being a paranoid and underpromising and overdelivering is good. ferrari is always like.. we are the legacy team and have been here since day1. even kimi won because mclarens were infighting. (nothing to do with kimi.. he is a multi-WDC material)
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
15th March 2023, 22:56
Red bull however is not as much underpromising as mercedes was, so I like them more, they’ve had some weekends where they said they were gonna be fast, they don’t always go in saying the others are faster like mercedes used to.
emuload
16th March 2023, 0:36
Ferrari is the big boys… This is the team that AFTER this “negative” streak has won over the course of F1’s history over 20% of all GPs, and has placed at least one car on the podium over half the races.
They last won the champinship in 2008. since then they have been consistently almost always 2nd or 3rd, with a few “bad” years here and there.
Is this good enough for Ferrari? no. never. not even a little bit.
Are they as bad as some of you keep banging on about…? well, maybe, but if they are everyone else is far worse.
Jere (@jerejj)
15th March 2023, 17:00
I thought he’d only get a third CE (meaning, not only the second but even the first copy somehow became entirely unreusable) with the other PU components remaining in use as they’ve only got used for a single event unless they also somehow turned unreusable for good. Nothing’s going well for Ferrari presently.
MichaelN
15th March 2023, 17:04
Embarrassing really. Vasseur & co have a long season ahead of them.
Let’s not be too quick to blame them though. This is all very early days for them, and this is very much still Binotto’s car.
Tifoso1989 (@tifoso1989)
15th March 2023, 17:59
Vasseur is still not convinced with the actions Vigna has taken. It was reported that he refused Mekies resignation who couldn’t stand Vigna questioning his work (or the lack of it) and taking away from him some responsibilities. I agree totally that Binotto’s legacy is hitting harder than ever this season as he was reluctant to make the slightest change to the people/procedures that were dysfunctional to say the least.
Jonathan Parkin
15th March 2023, 17:06
I’m sick of these penalties for using x number of components. Apart from turning qualifying into an utter joke, if too many drivers get them it means we have to spend ages sorting out who is starting where
We have a cost cap now. Couldn’t extra components fall into the CC budget?
Bryan (@ruz234014)
15th March 2023, 17:13
I completely agree. Limiting components was supposedly to reduce costs. With a cost cap that logic no longer matters. So let them use as many components as they want as long as they stay within the cap. The penalty for using too many will then be less cap available to develop the car.
MichaelN
15th March 2023, 17:19
The cost cap only applies to a portion of the budget. So these rules still serve their original purpose (even if no team actually plans to stick with the intended number of components).
petebaldwin (@)
15th March 2023, 17:46
That can be changed though. Make the allowed components excluded from the coat cap and then charge a set amount (the same for each team) for each extra component they use.
That way, we get away from grid penalties and give the teams a proper reason to avoid using too many components.
Andy (@andyfromsandy)
15th March 2023, 17:33
In order to add power units to the cost cap how much is to be added to the cost cap to cover how how many PUs initially?
At present it is basically 3 complete PUs.
A team will have to gamble on how much they need to leave in the kitty for a 4th, 5th or even 6th unit. Some teams didn’t need any extra but if they left enough in the CC for 2 extra as an example that is an awful waste on unspent money.
The only thing I see with past penalties is they are not lasting and teams game the system taking extra units when not absolutely necessary.
ryanoceros (@ryanoceros)
15th March 2023, 19:57
I agree. The cost cap should be expanded to include PU replacement costs and the replacement penalties removed. The current system favors the wealthier teams because the cost penalty means little to them but a lot to a team like Haas, and the grid penalties are uniform and affect all teams equally. Let them use qualifying engines if it pencils out budget wise. Let them swap in a new transmission for each race or even race session. The only reason I see F1 keeping the grid penalties is to manufacture excitement with a mixed up grid.
CarWars (@maxv)
16th March 2023, 2:15
Penalties for using components sounds indeed a bit like WEC. Not the genes of F1. Let’s make throwaway quali engines for max performance again.
Leroy (@g-funk)
15th March 2023, 18:15
It’s way too early to call Ferrari’s season over. Having said that, Ferrari’s season is over.
ryanoceros (@ryanoceros)
15th March 2023, 20:02
Ferrari will finish second or third like they have nearly ever year since 2007.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
15th March 2023, 23:01
Yes, and so far to me they looked better than mercedes, a dnf here and there doesn’t matter, especially when you’re not occupying the first 2 places (so less points lost if you retire), they looked a bit faster, however mercedes is likely to jump them over the course of the season, I don’t think aston martin will be able to beat any of the 2 in the constructors, while it’s still very impressive they’re fighting with them in races atm.
ryanoceros (@ryanoceros)
15th March 2023, 23:31
I think your take on Mercedes and Ferrari both finishing ahead of Aston Martin shows a sober interpretation of the season. It’s easy to board the hype train after Bahrain but I suspect their apparent advantage will decay rapidly as Ferrari and Mercedes sort out their cars. The difference in driver lineups also puts Aston Martin on the back foot.
CarWars (@maxv)
16th March 2023, 2:17
Ferrari can’t develop in season. Now getting to a bad start without a good head start, yeah its over
Mayrton
16th March 2023, 10:05
lol
Michael (@freelittlebirds)
15th March 2023, 20:21
Meanwhile Verstappen is writing his championship speech…
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
15th March 2023, 23:02
Ahah, that’s true, must be one of the earliest written championship speeches!
Todfod (@todfod)
16th March 2023, 7:12
I think he wrote it before Bahrain.
tielemst
16th March 2023, 14:35
Probably just changed the years in it.
Dane
15th March 2023, 23:42
Is it just me, or does it always seem like Leclerc’s car that has all the drama?
SteveR (@stever)
16th March 2023, 0:03
Might be just you. Maybe recall Sainz’ engine failure, fire, and car rolling backwards at the ’22 Austrian GP.
Todfod (@todfod)
16th March 2023, 7:13
You’re right… that one failure does make the use of the word ‘always’ redundant. How about ‘most of the time’?
BW (@deliberator)
16th March 2023, 7:17
2nd race (yet to start) and 3rd electronics control box. Not to mention the engine failure. So far, statistically their reliability is worse than 2022.
Does anyone seriously think that Ferrari is anywhere near a legitimate title challenge? The last time they put up an actual challenge was in 2008. (2010 and 2012 was Alonso – not Ferrari – who put up the challenge).
George.be
16th March 2023, 13:17
IMHO, the components causing or damaged by the DNF should be covered from the penalty. So if a component is dead after the DNF, the team should be allowed to replace it without a second penalty.
Of course the team needs to prove that the component is unusable after the DNF, not just at the end of its expected life