General

Ferrari chief: 'Verstappen and Red Bull were flying'.

27 August 2022 at 20:56
11
  • GPblog.com

Laurent Mekies expects a tough challenge on Sunday in the Belgian Grand Prix and despite the big difference with Max Verstappen in qualifying he is satisfied with Saturday's proceedings. The Ferrari chief saw his drivers work well together to create a promising starting position.

"Red Bull were certainly flying, Max was flying," Mekies pokes fun at Ferrari's social channels. "As you know both Max and Charles were actually out of the pole position contest because of their respective PU penalties. So in the end it was going to be between Carlos, Checo, the Mercedes but it was actually the Alpine in the mix somehow."

Sainz benefits from slipstream

Where Verstappen and Perez didn't help each other by giving each other a tow, Ferrari did. And with success. "It was good teamwork. It was very very tight against Perez, as you have seen, Carlos and Charles helped tow each other in Q2 and Q3. It’s always quite a complicated thing to execute, as you have the traffic, the timing, you have some other constraints, so that’s why you don’t see it so often. They did it so well together, that small help was one of the key factors boosting Carlos to start from pole tomorrow so that’s a positivem" he says.

Ferrari know they face a tough Sunday afternoon in the Ardennes. Mekies: "Red Bull are fast so it will be a very tough battle at the front with Carlos and Checo. On the other side, you are probably going to see both Max and Charles try to storm back through the field and go back up so it’s going to be certainly a strategic race again tomorrow and we’ll try to get as many points as we can."

Mekies talks about Ferrari's Saturday