Ferrari Team Principal Fred Vasseur admitted that a series of missteps – from a practice crash to an unlucky animal encounter – kept the team from reaching its full potential during the F1 Canadian GP weekend. Both Leclerc and Hamilton faced challenges, and while there were flashes of strong performance, Vasseur was clear that execution fell short. P5 and P6 was the result.
Hamilton hit groundhog, lost downforce early in F1 Canadian GP
Lewis Hamilton’s race was compromised just a few laps in after hitting a groundhog, damaging the front of his car’s floor. The incident, which occurred on lap 8 or 9, cost the car roughly 20 points of downforce.
“It’s true that we had a small kiss with the groundhog,” Vasseur said. “We damaged all the front part of the floor. It’s something like 20 points.”
While the car’s balance remained relatively stable, the damage limited Hamilton’s ability to compete at full pace. “Hopefully we didn’t have a big change in balance, but it was a lot of performance” Vasseur added. “We will send flowers to the groundhog.”
Leclerc frustrated by strategy call in F1 Canadian GP
Charles Leclerc was vocal on team radio during the race, unhappy with the call to attempt a long one-stop strategy. Vasseur acknowledged the driver’s point of view but stood by the team’s decision under the circumstances.
“They are a bit vocal and I discussed with Charles after the race that where he’s right is that we have not that much to lose when you are behind the pack and we can take some risk, but it was for us a bit too optimistic to do one stint of 50 laps with the hard. In terms of life first perhaps before performance, and we were missing probably also some laps during the weekend to estimate it ”
Vasseur: The pace was there, but mistakes added up in F1 Canadian GP
Despite the race result, Vasseur pointed to strong moments that showed the car had potential. Leclerc’s final qualifying lap included a purple sector in the opening one, an area where Ferrari had been losing a tenth or two until then.
“I think the analysis is the good one that we showed by the moment that we were into the pace that the lap of Charles is purple sector one. It was the weak point all over the weekend and the last lap it was purple sector one.
“I don’t want to say that we would have done the pole position but at least we would have been in a good shape.”
Still, Vasseur made it clear the team made “too many mistakes collectively,” referencing Leclerc’s crash in FP1, qualifying issues, and the groundhog incident.
“But I think we made too many mistakes collectively from the beginning with the crash in FP1, with the mistake in quali, with the groundhog in the race.”
Mercedes performance shows the standard
Vasseur used Mercedes’ strong weekend as an example of what clean execution looks like in a tight field.
“They were nowhere the last three weekends, and they were able to have two cars on the podium this weekend,” he said. “I’m not sure they changed completely the car. From lap one on Friday morning, they were there.”
He closed by admitting that Ferrari’s focus wasn’t consistent throughout the weekend- and that in a field this competitive, that’s enough to ruin a race.
“If you don’t do the perfect weekend, you are dead.”
