After a strong start to the 2024 Formula 1 season which saw both Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc take wins, Ferrari has floundered in the summer months.
The pecking order after the first round of the 2024 F1 season saw Red Bull established as firm favourites, with the rest of the big four teams (Ferrari, McLaren, Mercedes) fighting to catch up.
For the Scuderia, a Max Verstappen brake failure and a well-placed Sainz saw Ferrari halt the charging bull at Albert Park as the Spaniard won the Australian Grand Prix.
Over the winter, it appeared as if Ferrari had eradicated its tyre management issues, albeit at the expense of some one-lap speed.
However, Ferrari, well poised to become a consistent threat to Red Bull, failed to truly capitalise on Sainz’s Australia success and instead, McLaren emerged as the team ready to throw the gauntlet at the reigning champions with Lando Norris victorious in Miami and running Verstappen close at Imola.
Still, when F1 came to the glamourous principality of Monaco, Ferrari had the fastest car of the pack and at long last, Charles Leclerc delivered on his promise to take an emotional win on home soil.
That fateful day around the streets of Monaco was arguably the last time Ferrari had a genuine shot at victory.
The wheels started to come off for the Scuderia following an upgrade package introduced at the Spanish Grand Prix.
Rather than elevate Ferrari, the upgrades reintroduced bouncing to its 2024 challenger and the Maranello-based squad spent the following races testing set-up tweaks to eradicate the problem, eventually reverting to a pre-Spanish spec of SF-24 before pushing a revised floor to be implemented in Hungary.
Those difficulties saw Ferrari attain just a single podium finish in the six races following Leclerc’s Monaco triumph.
As it stands, the Scuderia is third in the Constructors’ standings with 345 points, 79 ahead of Mercedes in fourth, but the Brackley-based squad has won three of the last four races…
Ferrari Team Principal Fred Vasseur is confident however that circuits coming up after the summer break will suit its car in a bid to improve upon its current form.
“We have a good sequence of tracks for us with Monza, Baku, Singapore,” he said. “These are good tracks for the characteristics of the car.
Ferrari will be on damage limitation at Zandvoort once F1 resumes and hoping to build on Vasseur’s prediction with strong results during the three races after.
It’s imperative that comes to fruition or else Ferrari will fall behind Mercedes in the Constructors’ Championship by the time F1 reaches the season finale at Yas Marina.
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