Ferrari has ‘unsolvable’ problems - Mattia Binotto

Ferrari, Leclerc, France, Paul Ricard — Photo: © LAT Images

French Grand Prix

Ferrari has ‘unsolvable’ problems - Binotto

Tyre troubles cannot be fixed until a new car comes in 2022

Ian Parkes & Will Gray

Tuesday 22 June 2021 09:29

Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto has conceded the team has a fundamental issue with its SF21 that is destroying performance on certain tracks and is “not possible” to solve this season.

The Scuderia posted its first no-score this year as Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc finished 11th and 16th in the French Grand Prix, with its struggles blamed on issues related to tyre pressures, which are a specific concern on certain tracks.

Binotto proclaimed Paul Ricard "a difficult circuit...with high-speed corners where you are putting a lot of energy into the tyres, hot conditions".

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He added: “If we look here from two years ago, we struggled. So I think for whatever is our car characteristics, this is not a track which suits it well but again, two years ago we had a problem, we should have addressed it.

“It is not yet the case but we are looking at the future at France as a lesson learned and [we need to] make sure that this time we get the opportunity to be able to solve it."

Ferrari needs hardware change to solve issue

Although Binotto has conceded there is no quick fix to the problems, he is certain the issues will not occur at every track.

But until a new car arrives next year, though, there will only be improvements rather than solutions this season.

”Can we develop it through a simple development on the current car? Probably we could improve the situation but to solve it would need some hardware change, for example, the rims, which is not possible in the regulation," added Binotto.

“Iit is more important for us that we are at the stage where we can understand and try to address it for next year. In the meanwhile, this issue will happen again at some races but not all of the tracks.

“It will be track and weather-conditions related. We need to prepare ourselves in case of such a situation in the future and at this track, it may be a bigger problem since it happened again."