Carlos Sainz says adverse weather and tyre graining are two ingredients that could spice up Sunday’s Canadian Grand Prix and help Ferrari move forward following a disappointing qualifying session.
Sainz and teammate Charles Leclerc both failed to secure a spot in Saturday’s Q3 shootout, leaving the pair just outside of the top ten, respectively P11 and P10 on the race’s grid.
The dismal result was a shocker for the Scuderia’s drivers given their strong from in Monaco two weeks ago and Leclerc’s dominant win in his home race.
After qualifying, the Monegasque was at a loss to explain the sudden loss of pace of the Italian outfit’s SF-24 around the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, especially in dry conditions.
Sainz was also baffled by Ferrari's subdued performance had disappeared, but the Spaniard reckoned that a combination of factors had contributing to the team’s struggles.
"I think right now, I can just tell you we are lacking grip and our ride doesn't look as good as it did in Monaco," he said.
“For these two reasons, lack of grip, warm-up, ride, everything around Canada seems trickier than Monaco.
"We are a bit surprised, everyone knows, because since FP3 really we saw we were slow and this weekend was going to be a tough one, and you never expect to go from fighting for a win and pole position to being out in Q2, but this is Formula 1.
"I've seen worse things happen and we will go back and analyse why we're struggling around here."
©Ferrari
While Ferrari will have its work cut out for it in Sunday’s race, Sainz is hoping for a helping hand from the elements and perhaps tyre management to carry him forward.
“There are two or three factors that could spice the race up, which is the weather and the graining,” he said.
“There was a lot of graining in FP2, and mixed weather coming [for the race], so these two things hopefully will make the race chaotic and we can move forward.”
Sainz reckoned that McLaren, his former team, is currently the field’s most consistent performer, but Sainz questioned whether Ferrari had fully optimized the set-up of its car in Montreal.
“Everyone is a bit up and down so far this year, and maybe the most consistent team right now is McLaren, since Miami, at every track, they've been fighting for pole,” he said.
"They're two-hundredths off, which is almost pole and apart from them, we need to understand if there is a problem with the tyres, we didn't switch them on, or if it is just simply a mistake in the way that we are running the car this weekend."
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