Carlos Sainz makes bold Ferrari statement as rivals fight to catch Red Bull

Thomas Maher 13 Oct 2023 2:30 PM

Ferrari's Carlos Sainz — Carlos Sainz is looking like a born reborn according to David Coulthard.

Carlos Sainz believes Ferrari are the team to be able to take the fight to Red Bull once the 2024 F1 season rolls around.

Singapore Grand Prix winner Sainz is the only driver to have broken Red Bull’s stranglehold on victories in 2023, with the Spaniard proving unbeatable around the streets of Marina Bay.

Ferrari have been there-or-thereabouts in terms of competitiveness this season, scoring three third-place finishes, as well as one second-place, and Sainz’s win – putting the Scuderia in third place overall and eyeing up Mercedes’ second place spot.

Carlos Sainz: Ferrari only team to stand up to Red Bull

Since the ground-effect regulations began at the start of 2022, Ferrari are the only team to have had a genuine answer to Red Bull at any point in the near two seasons since – albeit with that answer only coming in the first handful of races last year.

With Ferrari, Mercedes, Aston Martin, and now a resurgent McLaren vying to be best of the rest behind Red Bull, Sainz believes his team are in the best position of all.

“我am always optimistic before the season starts,” he told Spanish press at a sponsors event, when asked about his championship hopes for next year.

“我was also optimistic last year and we stumbled. You have to be.

“我think that if you look at the last two years, the only ones who have been able to stand up to Red Bull a little have been the Ferrari, in the first half of last year and now with the victory in Singapore and the podium in Monza.

“Since there are these new regulations Red Bull is unbeatable, but if there is someone who can win from time to time to Red Bull, it’s us. I think I’m in the best place to try again next year but there are still six races left and we still have to focus on what we can improve to arrive prepared.”

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Ferrari are just 28 points behind Mercedes with five race weekends to go, with the two teams enjoying similar performance levels. Sainz’s failure to start the Qatar Grand Prix handed Mercedes an opportunity to pull away, only for Lewis Hamilton and George Russell to collide at Turn 1.

Russell returned to finish fourth, with Charles Leclerc fifth, minimising the potential damage in the Constructors’ Championship. Team boss Fred Vasseur is optimistic that his team can still turn things around against Mercedes between now and the Abu Dhabi GP.

“我t’s true that, if you put everything together the wing, the succession of very high-speed corners and so on, it’s not where we were expecting to have the best result in these conditions,” he said after Qatar.

“少分比奔驰end, it’s not a drama for us. We’ll have better weekends in the future.”