Ferrari was forced to wind down its development programme much sooner than Red Bull as it approached its approximate $144 million spending ceiling.
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Ferrari has revealed that it was forced to halt development of its F1-75, not to shift its focus to its 2023 car, but simply because it ran out of money. Ferrari’s 2022 contender had an early advantage over Red Bull and maintained that lead throughout the first half of the season, despite the Scuderia’s results being hampered by several strategic missteps and mistakes. However, as the season progressed over the summer, Ferrari was forced to wind down its development programme much sooner than Red Bull as it approached its approximate $144 million spending ceiling.
“It was not a choice; we simply finished the money for the budget cap,” explained Scuderia boss Mattia Binotto. “So simply we were at the cap – no more opportunity of developing the car, so we simply stick where we were.” Binotto made it clear that halting development – particularly the production of new parts – due to a lack of funds did not imply that the Italian outfit had reduced its research on next year’s car.
“Obviously we didn’t compromise next year’s car development,” he said. “But certainly we decided to stop the current one, because on top of this normal development on the current [car], you will need to produce the parts to bring them on track. And that was the extra costs that we couldn’t afford.”
Ferrari’s lack of updates had inevitably hampered its performance in the second half of the 2022 season, both in comparison to Red Bull and to Mercedes. The Brackley team’s performance has been improving in recent races. So Binotto was not surprised by the team’s strong performance in Brazil or George Russell’s victory.
“It’s not a surprise. I think that they were fast in Brazil,” he said. “It’s not surprising because, if I look at the last races, maybe with a different tyre choice, they would already have won races. And I think that they simply didn’t win because they missed the right choice of tyres. They have been the fastest car in the last races, so not surprising coming here in Brazil. They brought a new aero package in Austin, which I think worked well, and they are capitalising on it.”
