[ 2020 ] Scuderia Ferrari - Ferrari

[PlatinumZealot]

Well Vettel says the car is "undrivable". Meanwhile, Leclerc was smooth, consistent and put the very same car on the podium. This raises serious questions about Vettel's driving ability, or lack thereof.

This sounds like last year. Vettel is not comfortable with an unstable car, whereas Charles can live with it. I dunno, I think letting go of Vettel is the right decision the more I look on it. Vettel should really go for the Renault seat, it would a fit for the lower calibre he is at right now.

[LM10]

Of course it's been his fault. He needs a solid rear and obviously can't fully adapt his style when he's not happy with how the car behaves. That surely is his weak point.
But this season I don't know how you can be angry about driver performances.

Well Vettel says the car is "undrivable". Meanwhile, Leclerc was smooth, consistent and put the very same car on the podium. This raises serious questions about Vettel's driving ability, or lack thereof.

Did you read the part which I wrote and which you actually quoted properly? If yes, you should know that I already implied that Vettel drives quite poorly when he's not happy with the car. Leclerc, on the other hand, makes the car look faster than it is and squeezes everything out of it.

[ScrewCaptain27]

I think the car might actually have a serious ERS issue, not related to the fuel trick. Read my post in the engine thread.

[JordanMugen]

Leclerc, on the other hand, makes the car look faster than it is and squeezes everything out of it.

Well the car is as fast as it is, it's impossible to "make it look faster"!

Vettel drives quite poorly when he's not happy with the car.

Ferrari have the data overlays to show Vettel how to follow Leclerc's technique though.

[MtthsMlw]

[LM10]

Leclerc, on the other hand, makes the car look faster than it is and squeezes everything out of it.

Well the car is as fast as it is, it's impossible to "make it look faster"!

What I mean is that Leclerc is able to drive around the problems the car has. He also had his issues today, though. I can remember two moments when he almost lost the rear. So there surely are better cars than the SF1000 you want to be in at the moment.

Vettel drives quite poorly when he's not happy with the car.

Ferrari have the data overlays to show Vettel how to follow Leclerc's technique though.

I don't think it works that way. Vettel's style is a part of him already. He's not a rookie and whatever he can or can't do now won't change in the future.

[LM10]

Well Vettel says the car is "undrivable". Meanwhile, Leclerc was smooth, consistent and put the very same car on the podium. This raises serious questions about Vettel's driving ability, or lack thereof.

Watch this and decide for yourself if this car looks driveable or, indeed, undriveable. And like I already told, also Leclerc had his moments and could have lost the car quite a few times. He fortunately didn't, Vettel unfortunately did once.

[timbo]

The car has apparent handling problems. It did look nervous in the test too.
Yes, Leclerc seems to deal with it better, but ultimately, if the car is that flawed, there's no chance for a title anyway.

[Tzk]

He needs a solid rear and obviously can't fully adapt his style when he's not happy with how the car behaves.

Vettel told RTL that they needed to seriously trim the front downforce to get the oversteer out of the car. As you pointed out Vettel needs a planted rear while Leclerc can live with (a bit of) oversteer. That's why Leclerc was p2 today and Vettel finished p10 and not the other way around. Vettel isn't happy with the car behaviour at all. Maybe Leclerc can also just drive around the issues a bit better than Vettel. Still the car is crap compared to the mercs.

[Jolle]

2nd had more to do with luck and experience, not with a good car. It is strange, in the last year (when the car was designed) of a rule period, you can unbalance a package so much. Looks like they lost on both engine as on chassis/aero.

[f1316]

I think the car is unbalanced because they’re making compromises to wing levels to make up for lack of power; it seems like they have decent downforce judging by their pace through the corners.

What’s incredible to me is how bad the engine is now that whatever they were doing is not being done - it seems like all their development went into whatever ‘tricks’ they were doing and what’s left is a slower engine than the others.

After all, For all Mercedes’ dominance, pole was all of 0.1 faster than last year’s.

[LM10]

I think the car is unbalanced because they’re making compromises to wing levels to make up for lack of power; it seems like they have decent downforce judging by their pace through the corners.

What’s incredible to me is how bad the engine is now that whatever they were doing is not being done - it seems like all their development went into whatever ‘tricks’ they were doing and what’s left is a slower engine than the others.

After all, For all Mercedes’ dominance, pole was all of 0.1 faster than last year’s.

And that's what makes me think most. Were they really that stupid to put all the work into that engine trick in order to improve it? I hope not, but at the moment I don't have another explanation.

[basti313]

The car has apparent handling problems. It did look nervous in the test too.
Yes, Leclerc seems to deal with it better, but ultimately, if the car is that flawed, there's no chance for a title anyway.

One could see a lot in turn 3 when Vettel was behind Stroll. He nearly ran into Stroll when he was chased by Ric (lap 15) just like he did it later with Sainz (plus too late on the brake in the later case).
The reason was that Vet takes a completely different line in turn 3, he turns in way earlier and takes much more speed to the apex (early apex). The others turn in later and have a cleaner exit (late apex).
Obviously the stile is relying 100% on the rear being well under control. It is strange, that he tries to stick to this style, while everyone else was on late apex in turn 3.

[search]

After all, For all Mercedes’ dominance, pole was all of 0.1 faster than last year’s.

it was interesting to see, that no team really improved by more than a ~tenth from Q2 to Q3 though (apart from Red Bull, but that was mainly tire related). So maybe not only Ferrari is affected by the rule clarifications, but others lost their "party modes" as well?!

[MtthsMlw]

Because the field was so close together everyone used their Q3 mode in Q2 already.