F1, Ferrari at crossroads: team orders coming for Leclerc and Sainz

Ferrari sport director Mekies: “Team orders to Leclerc and Sainz? We will not wait for the math.”

Ferrari sport director Laurent Mekies admitted that team orders and a driver hierarchy could be introduced at some point in the World Championship: “Ferrari comes first, our goal is to get the best possible result for the team. Obviously if the position ii championship requires it, there will come a point when we will have to focus more on one driver than the other. This will not mean waiting for the math, but the moment when you think it is the best thing to do,” he said on the sidelines of the Hungarian Gp.

Leclerc and Sainz are just 22 points apart and the choice will not be easy: “Charles is a great driver, mistakes can happen. He doesn’t need us to find the limit. Carlos has had three extremely positive weekends: Silverstone, Austria and France. He has made great progress since the beginning of the season. We had to work a lot with him and his engineers to give him a car he can feel more comfortable with.”

“Leclerc more prone to emotion? Not so, they are two different things. You have to give the right weight to what you hear on the radio, taking into account the adrenaline dictated by the moment. With both of them we had ups and downs, but once they come back to the pits, analyze the data and understand what happened, they reset immediately.”