Laurent Mekies, Ferrari's sporting director, adopted a confident tone and admitted he sees the Italian team's chances of success at the Red Bull Ring
After a qualifying session in which the Ferrari duo was very close to pole-position Max Verstappen, Laurent Mekies, the Italian team's sporting director, said that the Maranello team was expecting a close competition with main rival Red Bull.
In Friday's qualifying practice for the sprint race in Austria, Charles Leclerc took second place, only 0s029 behind the reigning world champion. In turn, Carlos Sainz was third, 0s082 behind the first-place finisher's time.
"We knew it would be a very close qualifying, a direct confrontation between us and our competitors. During free practice this morning, we worked hard to optimize our package and were competitive enough to fight for pole - down to the nearest thousandths of a second. We couldn't secure first place, but that can happen when the differences are so small and it's all part of the game. We'll try to change that in the race," he said.
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Mekies also adopted optimistic speech to highlight the chances Ferrari has at the Red Bull Ring. According to the sporting director, the weekend's format, with sprint racing, maximizes the opportunities for the Italian outfit.
"The main aspect of this weekend is that it is very long. Effectively, it is a 400-kilometer race, divided into two parts. We saw that our potential is there and we started off on the right foot. Now, we here at the track and our colleagues in Maranello can look forward to a really interesting challenge. The gap to our rivals is minimal, so if we want to reverse today's result, the smallest detail can make the difference. We will do our best to make sure our drivers have everything they need to get even more performance out of their cars," Mekies added.
GRANDE PRÊMIO follows LIVE and INREAL TIME all the activities of the weekend's Austrian F1 GP. On Saturday, the second free practice session opens the day at 7:30 am (GMT-3). The sprint race starts at 11:30am.