A year after his first success at Silverstone, Sainz triumphs in Singapore by signing his second victory with the Cavallino. The Spaniard ends Red Bull’s record-breaking dominance and brings Ferrari back to the top step of the podium after 432 days.
This is not only a great achievement for Sainz but also for the team principal Frederick Vasseur, with the Singapore Grand Prix win being the first one of Scuderia Ferrari under his leadership.
After the race it was asked to Vasseur what were his feelings and how much does this victory meant to him personally:
“Honestly it was a strange feeling for me on the pitwall because I was not too much stressed the last couple of laps, honestly I was much more stressed when I watch again the last couple of laps one hour after the race than during the race and perhaps that is the feeling that Carlos was really under control of the situation and emotional – yeah, for sure on the podium it’s a bit emotional because it was the first one.
“But at this stage I was more thinking about what we did from Jeddah, Jeddah was a tough weekend for us and we had a very good recovery after Jeddah, a good teamwork and I think we picked up step-by-step the confidence and the pace. I’m more than proud for the job done by the factory and the team.”
For the Maranello team it has been a difficult season so far. Some improvements had been witnessed already in Monza at a high-speed venue, but it turned into an even more excellent performance at high downforce in Marina Bay.
Regarding the step forward that seems to have been made, the team principal commented:
“For sure it’s difficult if you compare with Zandvoort, to imagine that we will be in a [unclear] in Singapore, but I think it’s also linked to the fact that we had a good weekend in Monza, from P1 in FP1, we picked up the confidence also in Monza and Singapore is also the consequence of this one and the fact we have Carlos so quick at the beginning of the weekend was also very helpful for us and he did a very good job from the first lap to the last one, really the last one. And with Charles we had a positive evolution and it’s the best way to improve.”
Over the last few laps, Russell, sitting third with medium tyres, started to put considerable pressure and increase the pace, determined to take the first position from Sainz. The Spaniard consequently decided to go for a strategic move: slowing down to let Norris come back in DRS in order to keep the Mercedes at bay. Asked if it was a team idea, Vasseur said:
“It was the idea of Carlos, I don’t want to say it’s of use, but he knew he was more at risk with Mercedes than with Norris. With Norris we had the same tyres, almost the same pace from the lap one and we were not really at risk with Norris except if we lost the tyres and it was a clever move from Carlos to keep Norris into the DRS.”
Photo credit: Scuderia Ferrari
In the course of the race Leclerc instead played the role of defender. By starting the race with soft tyres he managed to overtake Russell and keep him behind, protecting his teammate from a possible attack in the first stint. Regarding the strategy adopted, the team principal said that conversation have been going on between Leclerc and Sainz before the race:
“The plan was to overtake Russell, not to overtake Carlos. We knew that track position is crucial in Singapore and the best way to protect Carlos was to have Charles behind him. It’s why also we asked at one stage to Charles to slow down a little bit to protect from an undercut from Russell and it was as per plan from lap one.”
Until the Safety Car, due to Sargeant going straight into the barrier at Turn 8, Leclerc was part of leading group in P2 but then after the pitstop he dropped back in sixth position because of the double stack and an error shortly after the restart. Vasseur explained what happened:
“Charles lost two or three positions with the VSC with the traffic with Lewis first, then at the restart, he lost almost the car and he lost another one or two positions in Turn 3, and he was P7 or something like this. But then he had a good recovery, but perhaps he pushed a little bit too much and he lost the tyres the last couple of laps. But I think it’s not due to the track position.”
In conclusion, he shared his thoughts on the work done by Sainz and getting up to speed quicker at the start of weekends since the action resumed following the summer break.
“The last two weekends Carlos did a very good step forward and probably also into the preparation of the weekend. The biggest difference is that he is ready from lap one FP1, Zandvoort was also the same. He didn’t do FP1, we had the rookie FP1, but from lap one FP2 he was there and it’s the best way to prepare the quali.
“If you don’t have so many sets of tyres, it means that if you are starting the weekend a step backwards, clear you have to overshoot the limit and also for the team in terms of preparation, it’s the best approach you can have.
“I would say that the main difference is not – okay, today he was under control in the race, he did a mega job and so, but I think the preparation of the weekend he did a real step forwards.”
