Vasseur: Ferrari still ‘putting the ingredients together’

Ferrari team principal Frédéric Vasseur has likened the team’s current challenge to fine-tuning a recipe, insisting that while the ingredients for success are in place, the Italian outfit must learn how to combine them more effectively if they are to return to the top step of the podium in 2025.

A new floor upgrade introduced in Bahrain last weekend showed promise, particularly for the high-speed demands of Jeddah.

However, while the Scuderia’s SF-25 is brimming with quality ingredients, the team has yet to score a top three result this season – a contrast to the consistency they achieved in the latter stages of 2024.

‘The Ingredients Are All There’

Vasseur believes that performance is undeniably in Ferrari’s car, but converting that into results remains a challenge in today’s ultra-competitive field.

“The ingredients are all there, but now it’s like cooking and you have to put the ingredients together at the right stage,” the Frenchman explained in Jeddah.

“Honestly, I don’t have the feeling that we’ve extracted the best from the car so far. Perhaps on some occasions, in some sessions.

“But I’d say it’s true for us and for the others. Even McLaren, with the step they have compared to the rest of the grid, sometimes you have one of their cars that is struggling a bit more.”

The modern Formula 1 landscape is unforgiving. Gone are the days when teams could coast through qualifying with a single lap on medium tyres, as Vasseur recounted.

“It is what it is. A couple of years ago, you could go [through] Q1 with a set of medium [tyres], do one lap, and you were in Q2. Today, even the top teams have to put on two sets of softs sometimes,” he added.

“Again, the field is very, very tight, and each time you make a mistake, you can lose five or six positions. Then the conclusion from [those] outside is that it’s a drama. We’re more focused on pure performance, and five hundredths is not a drama.

“That means we need to stay calm in the analysis if we want to improve. I think it was one of the skills of the team last year to be able to capitalise by hundredths of a second at a time. I hope we’ll follow the same path this year.”

This disciplined mindset is vital as Ferrari seeks to close the gap to rivals like McLaren, who have set the pace early in 2025.

Consistency: The Key to Unlocking Wins

While Ferrari’s car has shown flashes of speed – Hamilton and Leclerc were encouraged by its performance in Bahrain’s middle stint – Vasseur emphasizes that sporadic brilliance is not enough.

“It’s true that this stint went well for us. Unfortunately, the Safety Car came also a bit too early,” he noted.

Last month’s Chinese Grand Prix encapsulated Ferrari’s struggle: Hamilton’s sprint race victory was a high point, but the team faltered in the main event and was later disqualified for technical infringements.

“Now the issue – or the project – is to be much more consistent [than] to have a good stint in the race or a good stint in Q3 or Q2,” Vasseur stressed.

“If we want to come back and fight for the win, we need to have much more consistent weekends.

“This one has started in a good way. But I think it was a good example [in] China: The sprint race and the sprint quali went well and as you can imagine, we didn’t turn the car upside down after winning the first one for the day after.

“We are really on the edge.”

Read also:

• Hamilton downbeat after Jeddah tyre struggles: ‘Not the greatest’

The fine margins of 2025 demand a delicate balance, as pushing too hard can lead to costly errors.

“I don’t want to speak about the others, but as soon as you push a bit too much, you pay the price with the tyres the corner after. It’s really on the edge, very difficult to find the right balance. But we are improving in this direction,” he concluded.

With the SF-25 continuing to show promise in parts, Vasseur’s message is clear: Ferrari's route back to the top lies not in revolution, but in precision, patience, and putting the puzzle together – one consistent weekend at a time.

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