Ferrari Falters in Canada, Faces Q2 Knockout

From Monaco’s high to Montreal’s lows, Ferrari’s double Q2 elimination marks a frustrating turn for Leclerc and Sainz.

Ferrari faced a disappointing outcome in Canada, suffering a double elimination in Q2. Fresh from their success in Monaco where Charles Leclerc won and Carlos Sainz secured third, they will start from the sixth row in 11th and 12th positions respectively, a result that has frustrated Leclerc.

“We were slow and mishandled things. Both factors combined meant we didn’t make it to Q3. The lap wasn’t too bad, but it wasn’t anything special. I encountered traffic in turn 10, we’ll see if anything comes of it, but we simply weren’t fast enough,” Leclerc lamented to Canal+.

“Since we’ve been on dry tracks, we’ve been slow. We can’t get the tyres to work. This morning, we lost four-tenths in the first two turns; there were no issues but we lacked grip. It’s frustrating to go from such a good weekend to one like this.”

“However, we will try to climb back into the points as both cars are currently out of the points. We will do our best and I am confident that we can regain top form. The weather might play a role, so we need to be on the right side of the strategy and secure points in what has been a challenging weekend so far.”

Sainz expressed concerns during the morning’s free practice session about potential outcomes of this nature, and he wasn’t surprised that the Scuderia struggled, particularly after a challenging EL3.

“It was very tough, we saw from EL3 that we would struggle on this circuit. Despite our best efforts, we were eliminated in Q2, faced difficulties and had a bad feeling, the balance was off and it was easy to make mistakes,” the Spaniard explained.

“If you had told me before this Grand Prix how tough it was going to be, I wouldn’t have believed it. But after EL3, we knew it would be tough. I hope it was just the qualifiers, and we will attempt to do our best and overtake.”

Fred Vasseur, the director of Ferrari, admitted that the team’s poor performance since the last race was puzzling, attributing it primarily to the qualifying session rather than the general pace of the SF-24.

“I can’t quite explain it yet, but it was incredibly difficult to get the tyres to work. The Mercedes couldn’t go faster on new tyres compared to old ones, and we all ended up in this situation. We couldn’t pull everything together, and we’re paying the price, but we must stay positive as we are capable when the tyres are working,” Vasseur commented.

“I don’t think so. It was working well on the long runs yesterday, but the difficulty is getting the tyres to work on a single lap. A McLaren was able to make tyres work that had three runs, so it’s the same for everyone, and worse for us.”

“No, there’s no stress. It’s actually good for Formula 1 and the championship to have situations like this. Pérez also dropped out in Q1, and it’s great that we have such competitive density and four teams that can aim for pole. We should rejoice in this, even though it feels better when you’re first than when you’re tenth.”