Well, I would like to say several things about this. Of course, we can only speculate here, but the teams themselves know exactly how they have to assess the competition. There's a lot of effort being put into this with, as I think most people will know, GPS data, sound measurements etc. What stands out here is that Red Bull and Ferrari are very relaxed. At Mercedes it looks a little bit different. Yesterday I had a conversation with someone from Ferrari and I can only say that they are very satisfied and relaxed. This already shows that they are very sure to have a good car. He told me that most of the time they had lot of fuel on board all the time and they never actually made a real qualifying run. So even when they did their "faster" times, they still had more fuel on board than they would usually have. He also told me that they never looked for laptimes, not even with the faster times they did, it was all part of a well planed and organised programm and approach and you could feel the confidence when he said that. So correlation is definetely perfect and the car works just the way you want it to. And as I said - the teams know relatively well how good or how bad the competition is. So I expect Red Bull to be in front, but I also expect the SF-23 to be not far behind and to be the car with the greater development potential. However, this is where what really worries me comes into play, namely the development over the course of the season. Many people make fun of the fact that Ferrari never manages to develop the car as well as the competition during the season. But of course there's a reason for that. Ferrari used to be by far the best team here, back in the Schumacher era. The reason back then was that Ross Brawn, Rory Byrne, Jean Todt and Michael Schumacher really ran the race team. Ross Brawn had full technical responsibility and had this written into his contract. Of course, that didn't stop di Montezemolo from trying to exert influence here, as he had done all the years before and after that era. However, he ran into a wall, because Ross Brawn made it clear that he would not tolerate influencing his employees and ordering anything technical. Unlike the pre-Schumacher era and the post-Schumacher era, however, there was now a united front of race director, technical director, chief designer and number one driver who were completely loyal to each other and in complete agreement. The racing department is run by them, they are the professionals and not the president. And should the president not want or accept that, especially since the TD had even been contractually assured of that, as well as the chief designer, then they would leave, because that was not what had been agreed. So di Montezemolo was deprived of any influence concerning the racing team and the engineers could go about their work quietly and undisturbed, without the Ferrari or FIAT bosses messing up any technical things or development plans. And above all according to plan and in one direction. After the 2007 car that Brawn/Byrne and Schumacher were still developing was mostly finished, this ended and Brawn/Byrne and Schumacher left Ferrari. There came, as today, technical extremely capable people in their place, but people who no longer had the power to block out the disruptive influences and changes of direction of the bosses. An engineer could either do what the bosses wanted, or do what he thought was technically best, but that left him vulnerable. This is also the reason why some excellent engineers left Ferrari or others were fired after they argued with the bosses after failures regarding their interference that negatively affected the team technically.
This has not changed at Ferrari until today and this is the reason why Ferrari is usually worse than the competition in terms of development during the season. I always thought Binotto had at least managed to bring about an improvement in this respect. However, yesterday I had to learn that Binotto complained that he "can't do what I want". His "Pharaoh" system(which I will not go into) at least managed to protect certain other engineers, but he still couldn't prevent the interference of Elkann and Vigna. And I don't think Vasseur will be able to do that either, because he doesn't have Brawn, Byrne and Schumacher, and neither does Binotto.
As long as the bosses at Ferrari always interfere, it will be difficult for Ferrari to become world champion. History shows quite clearly the contrasts - in the Schumacher era, when this influence was locked out, Ferrari was able to reach its potential. In the era before and after Schumacher, you can see the flip side. This is Ferrari's real problem, and unfortunately it hasn't been eliminated.
Still, I think there is some hope. I think, even if this is my personal opinion or conclusion from certain things I've experienced, that Binotto has sacrificed himself in a way. After all, there was a huge falling out between him and the Ferrari bosses. I believe that Binotto (who has always said that 2023 will be the year in which Ferrari fights for the title and 2022 will still be a "development year") finally got his way, which cost him the same. He stopped the development early, concentrated the resources on 2023 and it was developed where the engineers thought it was best and not the bosses. Something else that gives hope is that Rory Byrne can still influence the design and they listen to him and he can steer it somewhat. Even though his influence is limited as a consultant and from Thailand, of course. The next thing is to maybe "let Vasseur do it" for now and hold back.
If you consider that everyone at Ferrari seems very relaxed and confident, this could ideally lead to a very good car with a lot of potential that has a fixed development plan in which, for the first time in many years, the bosses are not constantly interfering. Finally they have to realize the obvious - that they are the ones responsible for the "failures" of the last 15 years and that a F1 team has to work calmly and according to a plan in one direction and that these are the specialists who know what to do. I think the car itself is good. At least the confidence of the engineers points very much to that. Everything else depends on how Elkann and Vigna behave and whether the Ferrari bosses stay out of the F1 team for the first time since 2007 and let the people there do their work undisturbed. 2023 will be a decisive year for Ferrari in this respect.
Sorry, that was a bit much, but I think something like that has to be mentioned. Finally, I would like to say again that I have never experienced such confidence at Ferrari. And since the F1 teams usually know exactly where the competition stands, I think Ferrari is well prepared. At the latest when the first updates will come in the second or third race. But the car should already not be too far away from the Red Bull. Of course, this is a purely subjective assessment and I can be wrong, but it the impression of the Ferrari people conveys this quite clearly.
