JPBD1990 wrote: ↑13 Sep 2020, 04:36
IMO Vettel’s performances are a byproduct of the car being designed and setup to suit Leclerc. He likes a more rear-biased/oversteery car - remember in his early days with Alfa he commented on this after a few spins and said he needed to adjust to a more understeery setup for F1 vs F2. Vettel needs a planted rear end.
Similar to the redbull/verstappen problem. Max likes the car pointy AF, other drivers clearly find it difficult to have confidence when the car is so sharp/twitchy.
It’s not ferrari purposely sabotaging Vettel, but it is a byproduct of their priorities/focus changing from him and his preferences to Charles’. It’s unfortunate, but I have a suspicion that if the roles were reversed, Charles and a few other drivers would adapt. Seb has never necessarily had the quality. He’s fantastic when the car is sweet and setup to his liking. When it’s a bit off, he’s a bit off. Hamilton, verstappen, Charles, etc, may be able to drive around it a bit more.
Imo obviously
I don't think the car is designed around Leclerc. Engineers tend to design the best car possible and don't really build in features for one driver or the other. Sometimes a certain feature of a car suits one driver better than the other. The FW14 is a good example. Mansell just could turn the switch in his head and not relay on the counterintuitive feedback he got for the car where Patrese just couldn't. In the same kind of way the trickery that RedBull was able to do with the rear of the last of the V8 car's really suited Vettel, who for some reason just doesn't have the feel for the rear end (funny enough, he excuses the rear so much, that he already looks at the next corner while the rear of the car hasn't finished the corner he's in).
In the current formula the rear of the car in lively. Not just lots of power but also lots of electronics, turbo's etc working on the rear which could give it not the automatic response you'll get from a linear V8 with downforce trickery. This years Ferrari hasn't got any power to spare to artificial fix Vettel's rear end blindness (no extra rear downforce or a smoother engine program). They need every horse to push the car with as little drag as they can get away with. For me this also explains a lot of Vettel's drop in race craft since he's been at Ferrari. He just suddenly has to drive the rear of the car, where at RedBull it was just the front.
Don't expect any immediate results. Would assume they're mainly to see if they're on the right path for next year.