Ferrari team boss Mattia Binotto has revealed that the Scuderia was forced to "slightly lower" the power output of its engine during its 2022 campaign after suffering engine failures in the first of the season.
Ferrari hit the ground running in Bahrain last March, with Charles Leclerc winning the opening race of the season at Sakhir and then triumphing again in Australia.
The Monegasque and his team had established themselves as championship contenders against Red Bull and Max Verstappen when gremlins crept in, with Leclerc retiring from the lead in Spain after suffering a turbo failure.
Leclerc registered another engine related DNF in Baku, while his Scuderia teammate Carlos Sainz saw his chances of delivering a 1-2 to Ferrari in Austria go up in flames when his power unit spectacularly expired in the closing stages of the race.
In Abu Dhabi last weekend, Binotto admitted that reliability concerns during that period had eventually forced Ferrari to "slightly lower the power" of its engine.
That forced change, coupled with the front tyre degradation issues impacting Ferrari's F1-75 and a points deficit rooted in the team's own strategy missteps inevitably pretty much sealed the Scuderia and Leclerc's fate in their title fight against Red Bull and Verstappen.
Binotto singled out improving reliability as the Italian outfit's top priority for 2022.
"That’s our top priority because in order to win you need to be reliable and that has not been the case in the season, as a balance of the season itself," said the Ferrari chief.
But engine endurance won't be the team's only focus over the upcoming winter.
"The second is the speed of the car, because while we have been very competitive in quali, that has not always been the case in the race itself – and our race pace, whether it is from tyre degradation or pure race pace, was not sufficient for a better position."
Finally, Ferrari is working order to improve its team's organization in the strategy department to avoid the costly blunders that undermined the efforts of its drivers on several occasions this year.
But Binotto admits that a faster car goes a long way towards mitigation strategy or execution errors.
"If you develop a fast and reliable car, yes you may do mistakes on strategies or pitstops, but you can always compensate through the fact that the car itself is fast and reliable," he said.
"So that’s where we need to put our effort."
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