It's hard to compare the difference in level between Leclerc and Sainz in this race. I would even say it's more impressive than what Max did to Checo in Miami. Yes, I know it's controversial, but I will give two arguments - 1) in Miami there was basically no degradation for Red Bulls and some other cars, so both drivers had very long stints on Hards and 2) by their own admission Checo (on Mediums) was managing the first stint and Max (on Hards) was pushing.
Here it was reverse, Sainz was pushing on Mediums and Leclerc was managing on Hards. And they had the same pace while overlapping. It's stunning. Sainz is not much of a qualifier compared to Leclerc and getting the pole last year was quite telling of what he can do - both last year and this. And still, Leclerc was just outright head and shoulders above him the whole weekend. Sainz needs to start inventing better pace, immediately.
And judging by the pace vs Hamilton and Norris, he was more than capable of fighting for P2 with any sane 2-stop strategy Ferrari could have come up with. Hell, even if they followed Lewis for second stop the lap after he did, P3 would have been in the bag - easy!
An inside information from Ferrari is that Leclerc may have caused excess wear on the plank, since he was pushing over some parts of the track which were agreed to be managing zones (due to bumps, kerbs etc) in the final laps of the race to try and salvage any decent result after a complete strategy screw-up. Like so many races this year, when you take a look at lap times, you can easily see when the tyres start to go and all you need is one lap to confirm. Ferrari is completely in the dark about tyre behaviour and can't simulate their stint life accordingly. They are also insanely stiff and unadaptable when it comes to tweaking the strategy mid-race and these two strategy-related problems must be Vasseur's number 1 priority, right now.
Tyre incomprehension is also a major issue for suspension design obviously, but at this point it seems they somehow managed to take care of that since the start of the season. So it's not so much about being able to extract the maximum out of them, but rather understanding what that maximum is. And that requires being ready and able to adapt to conditions in the race and respond to the actual behaviour on track, rather than pushing with a pre-determined plan despite of everyone else around you giving up on that idea.
