F1 News
Binotto takes positives from France: "We're heading in the right direction"
- Nicolás Quarles van Ufford
Although Ferrari finished the French Grand Prix in third and fifth place, team principal Mattia Binotto still thinks there are positives to take away from the race, with the Italian saying his side "are heading in the right direction" with the development of the car.
The bad weekend for Ferrari started on Saturday, when a mistake from Sebastian Vettel prevented him from setting a time in his first Q3 run. His second and final run was also far from optimal and only got him to P7, behind the two McLaren cars.
Charles Leclerc started in P3 and stated he wanted to go at the Mercedes cars in front of him, but he ended up defending his own position more from the charging Max Verstappen behind him.
In the end, Leclerc gained fast on Valtteri Bottas and even got within DRS range in the penultimate lap, but the Monegasque couldn't make a move stick to steal P2 at the death to prevent a one-two for the Silver Arrows.
Vettel finished in P5, getting past the McLarens but not able to get close to Max Verstappen in P4.
"We cannot be happy," Binotto told Autosport after the race.
"We can only be happy with the times we will be faster than all the competitors.
"But we know we were expecting a difficult race weekend here in Paul Ricard.
"We were not expecting to close the gap at all here. We brought some upgrades, some worked well, others not.
"It's always a shame when something's not working. We've got some homework to do in that respect, but that shows we have some margin to improve the car.
"So at least the direction we are starting to set is the right one."