GP Australia, Ferrari second strength
In front of an overflowing Mercedes, the Ferrari was satisfied with third and fourth place in the Australian GP, the opening round of the 2026 F1 World Championship. The Scuderia therefore began the new technical era in the role of second force, a fact that would not have changed even in the face of the prospect of a double podium, which could have been achieved if they had stopped the cars on the Maranello wall under the Virtual Safety Car regime due to Isack Hadjar’s knockout on lap 12.
For Frederic VasseurHowever, even by stopping Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton there was no margin to fight with the Mercedes.
Vasseur’s words
“I don’t have a crystal ball, but I don’t think anything would have changed. At that stage of the race no one expected to stop, we wanted to go longer and make a stop later. Then we were unlucky with the second VSC (arrived on lap 19 due to the retirement of Valtteri Bottas, ed.)in which they closed the pit lane. But it went the way it went, it was a good race and it’s a good starting point“, this is the comment of the Ferrari team principal a Sky Sports F1. “We know where we are compared to them, we have a lot of work to do“.
“Yesterday the gap to Mercedes was bigger, but I’m not sure we did the best we could. We need to correct these small mistakes in China“he added.”I think the gap is about half a secondthen it depends from track to track. We have various things to improve before the next race and during the whole season. I said that the Melbourne picture didn’t count, the most important thing will be the ability to improve and strengthen the car: soon we will bring a nice update to the chassis, but we also need to improve on the engine and energy management. This applies to us, but also to everyone else: I’m not blind, Mercedes will probably improve too, but we have to focus on ourselves“.
