F1, fire in Austria: Carlos Sainz’s opinion on Ferrari engine

Reliability is an issue, but there is a lot of optimism.

Even at the Austrian Grand Prix, Carlos Sainz was forced to retire due to an engine problem in his Ferrari, which exploded just as the Spaniard was preparing to attack the Red Bull of Max Verstappen second behind Charles Leclerc. Yet his words, collected by the official Formula 1 website, tell of a driver who is anything but frustrated. And, indeed, definitely happy with the performance of his single-seater.

“We are a united and motivated team, which is certainly facing obstacles along the way. But we’ve made a major development to the engine this year, and I’d much rather take that development and have a few problems now and then than drive a car with a reliable but not at all powerful engine,” Sainz said.

The Formula 1 website also adds his post-Spielberg reflections, where certainly the frustration was greater but did not dent his confidence in Ferrari. “It is a hard result to digest, because it cost us so many points,” was Sainz’s analysis. “But it was clear that the one-two was within our reach, because I had a very good pace and I was doing very well on hard tires. Especially since, despite the high degradation, we were in control.”