Carlos Sainz wasn't able to fight at the front alongside his Ferrari teammate Charles Leclerc and Max Verstappen in the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, but the Spaniard insists he is slowly but surely getting there.
Sainz clinched in Jeddah his second consecutive podium finish, a result that contributed nicely to Ferrari's haul of points.
So far, Leclerc and Verstappen have split top honours, but the next man in line feels he is making progress, having now established a "clearer picture" of what he needs to join the fight at the front.
"I was happier than in Bahrain, definitely," he said after Sunday's race. "There's been a bit of progress done from my side of the garage with the feeling of the car.
"Having the opportunity to come back to this track, only 100 days after we were here with last year's car, has given me a much clearer picture of the type of corner and the two or three corners that I'm still lacking with this car.
©Ferrari
"It's quite clear for me now. It has given me a great opportunity to understand fully the magnitude of how much I need to adapt and how much I need to get the car a bit more to my liking, and I felt like, today, we did a small step in the right direction.
"While I'm still not 100 percent with the car, to keep bringing the points and the podiums is important until I get back to 100 percent – and then it will be time to join these guys at the top for the fight."
Sainz spent the first part of Sunday's race in fourth place but then inherited third when Red Bull's Sergio Perez pitted just before the safety car was brought out following Nicholas Latifi's crash.
However, the Mexican reclaimed P3 as the Ferrari driver exited the pits, having undertaken his own tyre change under the SC regimen.
But it later came to light that it was in fact Sainz who had had crossed the safety car line first when he rejoined the track.
Perez eventually gave the spot back, but Sainz was critical of the FIA's delay in judging the action, which in turn prevented the Spaniard from challenging Verstappen on the restart.
"In the end, we created a mess that for me is unnecessary, given the fact that we did six laps behind the safety car and there were millions of opportunities for Checo to let me by and have a good fight at the restart," explained Sainz.
"If I would have got passed by George Russell for example, what would we have done? Would Checo have had to let by Russell and me, which would have been tremendously unfair for him too, or then Checo doesn't give me back the position because there's Russell in between me and him and it's tremendously unfair for me.
"It's just these kind of things that, as a sport, we need to keep getting better at because I think we need to simplify things and just make it more quicker and easier for everyone to understand, and even for the drivers to go racing with a much clearer mind."
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