The Spanish GP has always been one of the more interesting events from the point of view sporty And technicianbecause the Montmelò track is very well known by the teams, given that pre-season tests were carried out until a few years ago, and above all it is very complete for a clear evaluation of the various cars. Ferrari arrived on the Catalan circuit with the second major package of innovationswhich concerned the bellies and above all the bottom as components designed to increase performance, as well as a new medium-high load rear wing as an adaptation to the circuit. “This package was not scheduled to be introduced in Spain but Barcelona is a fantastic circuit to evaluate the car. So if you can get ahead of a package here, you will try to do everything you can to do it.” – confirmed Jock Clear – “We have so much experience here at Montmelò that will allow us to do a good analysis of the new features and the whole package.”
Race for developments: Mclaren super but Ferrari has caught up with Red Bull
The Spanish GP allows us to draw a line and try to evaluate how the various leading cars have evolved, especially when compared to the Japanese GP which is positioned at the fourth round of the calendar this year. From the Miami GP, the race in which McLaren brought the first and only update to the track so far, the MCL38 proved to be the fastest and above all the most complete machine on average. “I think the best car currently is the McLaren”, confirmed Carlos Sainz at the end of the Montmelò match. Stella’s men brought to the track in the first American event of the season a package of 4 tenths, which however gave better results than expected in certain areas, especially in slow speed, thus allowing the MCL38 to perform on average and overall by as much as 6 tenths better than the specification at the start of the season. “The second sector of Barcelona showed us once again the improvement we have made at medium and low speeds and now our car works well even in a speed range that was our weak point twelve months ago.“ Andrea Stella made it known. If you consider that Red Bull’s steps forward, according to a rival team, are quantified at around 2 tenths of a secondit soon becomes clear that the Woking team now has a car that can compete against Max Verstappen’s RB20.
Moving on to Ferrari, even if the latest results could cloud the analysis, the two important packages that the Maranello team brought improvements to the track between Imola and Spainhowever, lower than what the team itself expected but better overall than those of the Milton Keynes team. We are in fact talking about an improvement that Ferrari engineers have estimated it at three and a half tenths so farwhen instead they should have been on average around half a second. In short, at least a tenth and a half is missing, in addition to that tenth to be added that can be found further thanks to the understanding of the package, as also stated by Leclerc himself in the pre-Canada. The appeal is mainly missing something related above all to the latest update package brought to the track in Barcelonawhich bouncing limited in actual gains due to the compromise choices in terms of setup which did not allow the SF-24 to perform at its best at Montmelò.
Race for developments: Ferrari is severely limited by the failure to resolve the problem in qualifying
In short, Ferrari developments are not to be considered (for now) like this negative, quite the opposite; they could evaluate in that way what was brought to the track by Aston Martin for example, which doubled the gap between Japan and Spain while Ferrari concluded the two races with a rather similar gap but with a pace that, above all, in Barcelona he was significantly limited by his starting position. Here, precisely in connection with this, it is important to underline how the two update packages were updates designed to increase the general performance of the SF-24, also through a change of the aerodynamic map to find greater performance in slow speed, but not to solve the more important ones relating to certain types of corners (especially the long ones) and especially in qualifying.
In fact, Ferrari has not brought specific updates to the track to correct the most important problems that have emerged since the beginning of the season, which now clearly make the Italian car more vulnerable, especially in qualifying and where Mercedes also seems to be in the game, as it demonstrated in Canada and Montmelò. The problem of the Italian team is not so much the effectiveness of the updates, but rather the typology, for this reason they cannot be considered as decisive as those brought to the track by Mclaren and above all Mercedes, specifically aimed at solving the negative points of the MCL38 and the W15. Solving the SF-24 ‘problem’ in qualifying would mean being able to manage the race more easily, would allow it to be shown truly that the updates have improved the Italian car, keeping it at the pace of the Red Bull and closer to a Mclaren which is really starting to scare. Maranello has some ideas, Leclerc also said so not long ago, however, it remains to be understood whether the problem will really be totally solvable this year or is it also connected to the chassis and mechanical part, considering that in the SF they are from Maranello surprisingly reviewing the chassis for the 2025 car.
