FERRARI sporting director Diego Ioverno cited wind as one reason why Charles Leclerc was disqualified from last weekend’s US Grand Prix.
Leclerc, 26, had finished P6 in the latest Formula One race before he and Lewis Hamilton – who had finished P2 – were disqualified for running illegal floors.
Their race results were canned after the planks on the floor of their cars were found to have failed to meet F1 regulations for the minimum thickness allowed.
The planks, which run along the centre of the floor on the car, are designed to protect the bottom of the car from scraping along the ground which sometimes causes sparks to fly as seen on TV.
Ride height can heavily impact aerodynamic performance, but cars have to be a certain height to meet safety standards, which Hamilton and Leclerc’s cars failed to do.
In a post to the team’s social media page, Ferrari chief Ioverno explained what had caused the failure, citing lack of practice, set up time and track bumpiness on the list of reasons for the ruling.
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The 49-year-old said: “The sprint weekend is very peculiar and you have very little time to prepare the car [with] basically only one session and then you go in parc ferme (when only minor adjustments are allowed).
“It means that from that moment onwards you cannot touch the car any more. On top of this, Austin is a super nice track but it is extremely bumpy.
“Bumpiness is a difficult topic for drivers and for cars, in the past almost everyone failed the suspension and failed the chassis.
“We knew it would have been tricky and this is the reason why we also lifted the car throughout FP1, and from our consideration it should have been OK.”
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In a similar vein to Jurgen Klopp famously blaming weather for a Liverpool defeat, Ioverno then said wind as another reason for the penalty.
He continued: “As a matter of fact, it turned out we were anyhow too marginal and also because of the wind that changed direction and had a stronger intensity than what was forecasted, this brought our car to not be legal at the end.
“There is not a lot to say and not a lot in this moment that we can do.
“With hindsight, rewinding the weekend we may have lifted even more the car but we would have lost performance, and we are here always to try to optimise our own performance.”
Reacting to the post, one fan said: “Unbelievable.”
A second said: “You have to be safe than sorry. This marginal change disqualified a car and Ferrari lose important points. Have to be more careful next time.”
A third wrote: “Irresponsible from a big team like Ferrari to let something like this happen, especially when their driver starts on pole.”
However, it should be noted margins in F1 – a sport constantly on the edge – such as weather changes and track temperature can make a world of difference to performance.
Following the disappointment, Leclerc and seven-time F1 champion Hamilton shared a joint post on Instagram of them looking miserable, captioning the post “mood”.
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Ex-F1 star and Sky Sports pundit Martin Brundle questioned why the remaining cars were not tested, given half of the checked cars had turned out to be illegal.
F1 returns next weekend at the Mexican GP.
Complete F1 2023 race calendar – details on every Grand Prix this year
Source: Motorsport - thesun.co.uk
