Carlos Sainz Jnr did not hide his frustration after a series of misfortunes in qualifying left him only ninth on the grid for the Australian Grand Prix.
Sainz had been quicker than team mate Charles Leclerc over the opening two sectors of his first flying lap in Q3, but was denied the chance to complete the lap when race control red flagged the session because of Fernando Alonso’s crash at turn 11. Sainz was mere metres from the finishing line when the session was halted.When Q3 eventually resumed, with seven minutes remaining, Sainz did not take to the track again until there were only three minutes left on the clock, meaning he didn’t have time to run extra laps to prepare his tyres as others did.
“What do I have time for?,” Sainz asked race engineer Riccardo Adami as he made his way out onto the circuit. “Single push. Single push, I’m afraid,” Adami replied.
When he began his timed effort, Sainz was again quicker than Leclerc over the first two sectors of the lap, until he ran wide on the exit of turn 10 and onto the gravel, ruining his only effort. He was slowest of all drivers to set a time in the final qualifying segment, taking ninth on the grid.
“Fucking disaster,” lamented Sainz after crossing the line. “Fucking, fucking disaster.”
“Yeah, sorry about that,” replied Adami.
“The lap at the end we had a problem with the starter,” Sainz explained. “We couldn’t start the car. We went out three minutes later to when we were planning to go out, I couldn’t prepare the tyre. I couldn’t warm up the tyre.
“Everything was rushed and I had to do a lap with freezing tyres on and it was a horrible lap for that. It was gravely un-luck. Everything that could go wrong in Q3 went wrong, especially because I was in the fight for pole position for the whole quali.”
After two rounds where he had been both out-qualified and out-raced by team mate Leclerc, Sainz admitted he was “angry” about his missed opportunity in Melbourne. “We shouldn’t have these problems with a starter and it was just a disaster,” he said.
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Emma (@emma)
9th April 2022, 13:32
As usual, lots of comments denigrating his efforts came in before the posters knew the full story. Interestingly, even with these facts, there will be those that insist it was entirely his fault.
wsrgo (@wsrgo)
9th April 2022, 13:58
@emma I understand the difficulties but the mistakes on the last lap are still down to him. Tyres being cold doesn’t prevent you from completing a hot lap, it’ll just be slow, but it would have been better than P9. Instead he went hell for leather on tyres that were not in the correct window and couldn’t put in even a respectable lap.
LosD (@losd)
9th April 2022, 14:04
@emma Because it kinda was? He was up, then threw it away in the final sector. Can’t blame cold tyres on that.
Roth Man (@rdotquestionmark)
9th April 2022, 14:48
Yours was the first comment on the article?
Sensord4notbeingafanboi (@peartree)
9th April 2022, 17:39
It was, you can’t cry wolf, I suggest he signs for Wolff instead.
Gusmaia
9th April 2022, 13:45
Things like that is what prevent me to lock Leclerc as WDC. Ferrari finds innovative ways to f-up their drivers.
Besides that, Sainz might be feeling some pressure as he does not seem able do follow Leclerc’s pace – outside some odd lap.
MG1982 (@mg1982)
9th April 2022, 14:15
Well, RBR stands a lot better here with both cars retiring in the 1st race due to mechanical problems!
MG1982 (@mg1982)
9th April 2022, 14:23
I have no idea where this info that SAI was better than LEC in the 1st 2 sectors of the last run comes from. On TV I saw that SAI finished the Quali before LEC, with 10sec to go, and had Yellow-Green-Green sectors, finishing off by 1.254sec. Then LEC took the PP with Purple-Green-Purple. Did SAI started another lap with 10sec to go that wasn’t shown on TV somehow??
wsrgo (@wsrgo)
9th April 2022, 14:39
@mg1982 He was quicker than Leclerc’s banker, not the final lap. That clarification should be there.
stefano (@alfa145)
9th April 2022, 15:29
the color, say purple, is relative to other’s completed *and fastest* laps. Means that if you make the record in a sector but the total laptime is not your best, that fast sector you did is not taken as reference as the fastest.
Iosif (@afonic)
9th April 2022, 15:49
I understand that he was unlucky but Ferrari had the pace to get at least P4 easily. He failed to do that by making a mistake and compromised their race tomorrow by being out of the picture. Really bad session for Carlos. Brilliant drivers differ from good drivers because they deliver under pressure and he seems to struggle to do that.
Biker56 (@biker56)
9th April 2022, 17:34
His last run in Q3, the car wouldn’t start for 3 minutes, leaving no time for tyre preparation. Carlos is right, Ferrari should not still have issues like this. I remember the mistakes they made when SV was driving for them.
Ferrari historically always had a clear #1 and #2 driver, maybe that tradition has continued, deliberately or not?
Sensord4notbeingafanboi (@peartree)
9th April 2022, 17:38
Ferrari shoundn’t have the Sainz jr problem. Unlucky on the red flag botched his 2nd run. Sainz jr only had to post a sensible time, take Verstappen’s 2nd run, quite conservative in Max’s terms.