One of the many beautiful things about Formula 1?
Ferrari hoping upgrades can close the gap to McLaren and Max Verstappen
Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton are hoping Ferrari’s upgrades can close the gap to the front of the F1 field
Mark Schofield is a former college quarterback and attorney covering the NFL and F1.
The answer to what ails a team could be right around the corner, in the form of the next set of upgrades to their challenger.
That is what Ferrari is hoping for, as the team will roll out some upgrades to the SF-25 at this weekend’s Bahrain Grand Prix. The team is bringing an updated floor to Bahrain this weekend, with Italian media reporting that an even bigger upgrade package is planned for the Miami Grand Prix at the start of May.
Speaking with media in Bahrain Charles Leclerc sounded optimistic that the upgrades would help Ferrari close the gap to McLaren, and Max Verstappen, at the front of the field.
“We’ve got some new bits on the car coming [this weekend], which I hope will help us to close that gap a little bit,” Leclerc outlined on Thursday. “Whether it will be enough to close the complete gap I don’t think so, I don’t think there’s that in what we’re bringing here.
“I hope it will help us to be closer but it’s still quite a significant step. In Suzuka I think that this was the gap that there is between McLaren and ourselves which is three-tenths, and we need to work very hard in order to catch that.
“I’m confident that we can close that gap, whether again what we are bringing here I don’t think will be enough but hopefully short-term we will have other things which will help us to be closer.”
Still, Leclerc conceded that Ferrari might not catch “McLaren and Max” this weekend.
“Hopefully the gap will be a bit smaller, but I don’t think it’s enough to be able to be at the level of McLaren and Max [Verstappen] this weekend, but little by little hopefully we can close that gap a bit more,” said Leclerc.
On the other side of the garage, Lewis Hamilton pointed to “more downforce” as a reason for excitement heading into the weekend.
“We’ve got an upgrade this weekend, so I’m excited [that] we’re going to hopefully have a bit more downforce,” said Hamilton. “I’m not really feeling a huge amount of issues. We lack overall performance at the moment pace-wise, which we’ll hopefully take a step [with] this weekend.
“We’ve got an upgrade and got a better understanding of the set-up, so hopefully it should bode well for a better weekend.”
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