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Analysis shows how Carlos Sainz is crumbling under the Ferrari pressure
Carlos Sainz has been blown out of the water by Charles Leclerc in recent weeks. The man from Monaco has stamped his authority as the number one Ferrari driver for the 2022 Formula 1 season and is surely in a position to take the lead in their World Championship fight. This leaves Sainz to pick up the wingman role. But how did that happen? And where is Sainz losing out? GPblog looks at the data.
Best driver duo
A lot of talk and discussion took place about whether or not Ferrari had the best driver duo during the winter break. There’s certainly an argument for it, but nobody can deny that Leclerc is carrying Ferrari at the minute.
Sainz has only scored 53 points, which is around one-third of Ferrari’s total points. The Red Bull drivers are much closer to the 50% mark. In fact, for all of the Mercedes troubles, George Russell actually sits higher in the World Championship than Sainz.
The DNF in Australia obviously didn’t help. A poor qualifying session in Melbourne wasn’t entirely his fault. His first push lap got scrubbed off because of red flags, and a problem inside the Ferrari garage for the second run meant he wasn’t properly prepared. In an aggressive way, Sainz tried to do all he could to recover but he actually compounded the error by ending up in the gravel trap. Compounding errors have been a common issue in Sainz’s Formula 1 career.
Whilst a crash in the opening lap of the following weekend in Italy wasn’t his fault, he doesn’t get the same defensive remark for his crash in Friday’s qualifying session. In this case, Sainz was lucky it was a sprint race weekend so he could make up lost ground.
A similar thing happened in 2020 whilst driving for McLaren. In the 2020 Tuscany Grand Prix Sainz was involved in a pile-up through no fault of his own. A race later in Russia, Sainz took the shortcut on the opening lap and hit the barrier. A bit of a silly mistake as he tried to bounce back from the week before.
A similar thing happened in 2018. Sainz had a high-speed crash with Romain Grosjean in the British Grand Prix. A week later in the German Grand Prix, Sainz was handed a 10-second penalty for overtaking under a yellow flag. Frankly, a poor rookie error.
Twice in 2017, Sainz had a retirement due to a problem with his car and then crashed in the following race. Sainz doesn’t have many bad traits in his driving, but compounding errors is a common trend that he needs to stamp out if he wants to be in the fight for the World Championship next season.
How did he lose out to Leclerc in Miami?
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We’re five races into 2022. The Ferrari teammate duel is the only one on the grid containing a (including DNFs) 5-0 result in qualifying and a 5-0 result in the race, both in favour of Leclerc. Of course, this includes the crashes for Sainz, but those are unlikely to have made a difference to the score.
During the final run of qualifying for the Miami Grand Prix, that result looked likely to change. At one point in the lap, Sainz had a three-tenths advantage over Leclerc. The man from Monaco slowly ate into the delta, but it was Sainz who lost it. On the exit of the final corner, Sainz lost two tenths to his teammate. He actually backed out of the throttle and stepped down an extra gear, likely to correct a mistake. Meanwhile, Leclerc was able to keep the throttle pinned. A further example of Sainz crumbling under pressure when it matters.
Sainz has the ability to pull this back. He is one of the most talented drivers of his generation, he got the driver at Ferrari for a reason. He got the contract extension for a reason. Sainz is a brilliant driver who just needs to settle down, hit the reset button and relax a little bit. During a busy European season, Sainz has to be performing to his full potential in this title battle.
