Carlos Sainz tells Ferrari what they must ‘celebrate’ in underwhelming F1 2023

Carlos Sainz said Ferrari must “celebrate” doing the maximum with what they have despite being lower down the order than they were last year.

Heading into the 2022 summer break, Ferrari were on 314 points and still within reach of leaders Red Bull yet a year later, they are P4 on 191.

It has been a difficult season for the whole team with changes to the management structure, departing staff members and an underwhelming car but Sainz wants the team to focus on the positives.

Carlos Sainz wants Ferrari to focus on the positives as they move forwards

It has been a particularly challenging year for Sainz. While his team-mate has been able to score three podiums, Sainz has not stood on the top three steps in 14 races.

Despite this, Sainz trails Charles Leclerc by just seven points and wants Ferrari to focus on improvement moving into the second part of the season.

“[It was] obviously a relatively frustrating start when we kind of realised that was such a big step ahead of us,” he told media including PlanetF1.com. “And it was going to be difficult to challenge them [Red Bull].

“I think we all expected the car to be more competitive and ourselves to be more competitive than [we are].

“The field has got really, really tight and now you’re going through these massive ups and downs where some weekends you might be fighting for P3 and others, you’re just finishing with P8.

“Which in performance swing might mean your one tenth in front or one tenth behind, it’s that tight a field, which is not a lot.”

Despite these troubles, Sainz thinks Ferrari should “celebrate” achieving what they have done so far.

“So this looks very, very, very different when you come up with a P3 or when you come up with a P8,” the Spaniard said. “And now we just need to kind of accept that, that’s the fight that we are in.

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“One weekend, we need to go and fight for P4, P5 and that’s the maximum we can do.

“We need to celebrate the fact that we’ve done the maximum with what we have this year and focus more on maximising the car’s potential and the team’s performance in the second half of the season if we want to make sure we maximise our constructor points.”

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