Vasseur calls for ‘much better job’ from Ferrari at Monaco GP

It must feel like a punch in the gut for the Tifosi to accept Ferrari boss Fred Vasseur openly admitting that they are not as quick as McLaren, even at their very best.

But that seems to be life lately if you’re a Ferrari or Lewis Hamilton fan. 

The proof is in the pudding.

Ferrari have incredibly capable drivers who are hungry to compete.

It’s just that they’ve been put into absolute donkeys and asked to compete with the likes of McLaren or Max Verstappen – an impossible task for both Ferrari drivers this season. 

A ray of light cut through the dark clouds hovering over the Prancing Horse during last Sunday’s Emilia Romagna Grand Prix at Imola, as Hamilton and Charles Leclerc ended a disastrous weekend on a high note, taking home a P4 and P6 finish respectively. 

It was all thanks to some unusually decisive strategic action by Ferrari to start Hamilton on hard tyres, while most of the paddock went on a medium compound.

This gave the seven-time world champion time to climb up the order while the top of the pack had to pit for new tyres.

At the end of Emilia Romagna, the Ferrari crew actually looked upbeat, but still had to swallow a bitter pill – knowing that the data shows just how far behind the SF-25 is to the McLarens or Verstappen’s RB21. 

“I don’t think that we have the best car. Even when we are in good shape in the race, we are not faster than the McLaren,” Vasseur said.

“We are there, probably, but not fast enough.

“What is clear is that over the last three or four races, we have always had a much better pace in the race than in qualifying.”

With the European segment of the F1 calendar on the way after last weekend’s race at Imola, the paddock now set their sights on the sport’s most glamourous destination this Sunday: Monaco.

Home-town hero Leclerc will have the unfortunate pleasure of adding a bit more pressure on his shoulders, trying his best to not let down his fellow Monagasques. 

He will have some comfort in the fact that he took the win at Monaco last year, sending Ferrari fans into a frenzy, but the SF-25 is not proving easy to tame this season.

Especially in a race as tight as Monaco, Ferrari will need to find whatever pace they can ahead of this weekend.

Being almost impossible to overtake on, the Monaco street circuit is one of few races where qualifying is more important than the actual race.

Starting out from pole position can all but solidify a win at Monaco. 

Perhaps the only time an F1 driver was scared to start from pole in Monaco is when McLaren’s Aryton Senna was behind them.

Senna, the king of Monaco, grabbed six victories, eight podiums and five pole positions in just 10 GPs at Monaco.

But the modern-day F1 GOAT Hamilton will be also going into this weekend with some thimble of confidence despite Ferrari’s performance woes, knowing he is the fastest man to ever race the circuit. 

During the 2019 Monaco qualifying, Hamilton stripped the tarmac bare with a lap time of 1:10.166 seconds.

That was 13 seconds ahead of Senna’s fastest lap set in 1988, of course, with a much more technologically disadvantaged car compared to the Mercedes that Hamilton drove in 2019. 

But if there’s one thing elite athletes are good at doing, it’s overlooking all of the numbers, records and history to show up on the day and execute - much like Verstappen did at Imola last Sunday.

But the Ferrari boss vented his frustration over their lack of pace, and stressed the importance of Saturday’s qualifying session. 

“There is a bit of frustration for us. For sure, we need to put all our effort into this. Next weekend, in Monaco, on Saturday evening, it will be almost done,” Vasseur said.

“We have to (have) much more performance on Saturday.

“Monaco is probably a bit different on tyre management. We have to do a much better job on Saturday next week.”