Ferrari has improved his cars significantly, and it shows. But only Leclerc is bouncing ahead with his car, ending 2nd at the end of quali day. Saints is having a bad day, regardless.
- Overall, LEC has the higher speed almost the entire time.
- In the 1st turn, LEC comes from the straight at a higher speed than SAI. SAI hits the brakes earlier and with more force initially than LEC, who waits a little too long, losing the initial gap to SAI in the middle of the turn. They come out of the turn similarly, but SAI has to interrupt his acceleration and release the gas in order to have a better trajectory during turn 2. This phenomenon is seen in almost all of the fast turns during this lap. A very evident example of this is at turn 5. LEC only releases the accelerator, while SAI has to hit the brakes during this turn. This is likely because LEC’s car has a better grip than SAI’s. Additionally, it was raining during this race, which might have been part of the cause of this phenomenon as the rain can impact how the tires perform, for example.
- In the DRS zones, the different in top speeds of SAI and LEC is significantly bigger than the difference in top speeds between the two in non-DRS zones, where the gap exists but is smaller.
- During the straight from turn 10 to turn 13, LEC’s top speed is significantly higher than SAI’s. During this straight, SAI puts his car in the 8th gear and the RPM significantly drops. This impacts his speed during the straight and may be because of a probably with the gear change or a simple driver error.
- The DRS for SAI seems to be at a constant, non-zero number during this lap. This could be a data error or a DRS malfunction, which could explain the gap in the speed during DRS zones.
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