Mattia Binotto also insisted that the Ferrari's primary focus this season has always been on the crucial 2022 car design.
Follow Us
Ferrari team boss Mattia Binotto believes his team’s 2021 campaign must end soon because the Italian outfit “can’t take it anymore.” Ferrari’s performance has improved significantly since its disastrous 2020 season, with the Scuderia now sitting third in the Constructors’ championship, 39.5 points ahead of rival McLaren. With Ferrari’s attention and resources in Maranello now entirely focused on its 2022 contender, which it hopes will propel it back into the winner’s circle next year, Binotto’s crews will go through the motions in the season’s final two races. However, the sooner it is over, the better.
“What we had to learn we have learned,” said the Scuderia boss, quoted by Italy’s Corriere dello Sport. “We’re no longer developing anything and it’s inevitable that we’re scrambling to open a different chapter with a new car. I’ll say it sincerely, we can’t take it any more. We can’t wait for this season to end.”
Binotto insisted that Ferrari’s primary focus this season has always been on the crucial 2022 design.
“We never really developed the current car,” he said. “We introduced a couple of developments at the very start of the season and that’s it.”
“Except for the power unit later on but the power unit, again that was a development in view of 2022, so all our efforts from the very start of the season has always been the 2022 car, we never compromised it. So let’s say that it never came into our mind even to at some stage try to penalise 2022 at the benefit of 2021,” Binotto added.
The Swiss engineer also stated that Ferrari’s improvement this season versus 2020 was based on solid improvements across the board, particularly in its overall operations.
“I think if today we are reaching third place it’s because the team, the way they are working at various weekends has certainly improved a lot since the start of the season and not because the car itself has developed,” he said.
“It has made a lot of progress in terms of strategy, the way we manage, the communication with the drivers, the understanding of what we are doing. It has improved a lot in terms of tyre management. I think that the team since Paul Ricard developed a lot of small tools, methodologies to try to do it better,” the Ferrari boss continued.
“If I look at where we were last year, sixth, with little points in the championship, I think we made the most of we could do with the current regulations and most of the car had also very limited opportunities of development as well about the car in 2021. So overall, I think that the team has made great progress with what was possible to do, and for that I am so happy because yes, the third position is a great output of the efforts,” Binotto concluded.
