Fred Vasseur has explained the reasoning behind Ferrari’s decision to pit Lewis Hamilton under the late Safety Car at the British Grand Prix, with the Briton ultimately losing a place to George Russell as the race ended under neutralised conditions.
The Silverstone weekend was ultimately a huge success for the Scuderia as a second win in three races added further proof that they are the main challenger to Mercedes. However, while Charles Leclerc’s victory was a huge boost there was some frustration around the loss of a position for Hamilton who had to make do with third on the podium.
When the Safety Car emerged, after Max Verstappen’s spin into the gravel, Ferrari was faced with a difficult call. Out front Leclerc had a free stop to take soft tyres to protect his lead for a late restart, but the team knew that if Hamilton pitted from second then Mercedes would keep Russell out and he would jump ahead – which is exactly what happened.
As the cars toured round behind the Safety Car, Hamilton – on fresher tyres – was preparing to pounce on his former Mercedes team mate ahead. But, in the end, he didn’t get the chance and the race was never resumed, allowing a relieved Russell to hang on to second.
The loss of a position and priceless points was frustrating but, speaking after the race, Ferrari Team Principal Vasseur was adamant that it was the only decision to make on a day when Ferrari got everything right with Leclerc.
“You can discuss about Lewis, if it was the good call to pit,” he said. “But if you don’t pit, Russell pits, he’s with new soft, and we are with old hards in front of him, and we are taking the risk.
“Also, we were a bit surprised that the Safety Car could stay so long, and we were expecting a restart, and I think we can discuss at length about the call. But if I have to do it now, I will do the same.”
Looking at the bigger picture Silverstone showed that Ferrari is making progress. The Austrian Grand Prix saw a disappointing blip with tyre management issues, but even there the SF-26 showed its inherent pace with P2 and P3 in Qualifying.
Despite the consistent form at tracks where Ferrari was expected to lose out on pure power unit performance Vasseur is keeping his feet firmly on the ground.
“We still have a deficit of performance, this we know,” he said. “And for sure it’s more difficult when you are going to Silverstone than when you are going to Monaco. That’s why we were not very optimistic.
“But in the other hand, I think it pushed us to chase the last amount of seconds everywhere, and we did a small step by small step all over the weekend to have a strong pace today.”
He also stressed that the British GP wasn’t just about horsepower, adding: “I think for sure it’s much more engine related, Silverstone, than Spain two weeks ago. But it was also the first time that we had windy conditions, and front limited – the characteristic of the track is completely front. It’s not just about the engine, and I think we did pretty well with all these topics.
“But next week will be another challenge in Spa. First the weather will be probably a bit different, but we have to start from scratch every single weekend. There is nothing magic – we can’t imagine making a step of five or six-tenths in one weekend, and it’s just the addition of small gains everywhere to make a difference.”
Car performance aside, the biggest message to take from Silverstone was that Leclerc has got his mojo back after a difficult recent run, with Vasseur insisting that he never lost faith in his driver.
“If you have a look, he was on the first row in Spielberg, he was consistently there,” he said. “For us with data, we were not negative. What was tough for him was the lack of points, the lack of results.
“I think the result of today is the best boost of the confidence that he can have. Also as we are developing the car from the beginning of the season, we need to readjust the setup each time, and I think that perhaps Charles on top had the change of brakes a couple of races ago, and we had to reshape a little bit everything.
“But it was not just a matter of performance. I think it was more a matter of confidence – and this will help massively today.”
