FERRARI FLAIR AMONG THE FLARES FROM LECLERC
Three days in Austria reaffirmed that Ferrari still has plenty to address before it’s on a truly even footing with Red Bull. Team orders indecision and pitstop strategy leave plenty to be desired, while a big question mark continues to loom over reliability. Those shortcomings ensured that the Italian team didn’t inflict maximum damage upon points leader Max Verstappen and his team last weekend. Nevertheless, it has now won two races in a row. And this time, Charles Leclerc triumphed on enemy soil because he executed the race brilliantly in a car that was demonstrably the pick of the litter.
The weaknesses of the Red Bull RB18 are few and far between. But even after mid-season updates, it remains a comparatively heavy beast – it exceeds the 798kg dry-car and driver minimum threshold. Those extra kilos make themselves known most of all when the machine is in its leanest trim. Running on fumes in qualifying or at the end of the race ensures that the excess fat contributes a greater percentage of the overall kerb weight. As such, although a scruffy final Q3 flier from Verstappen had been enough for pole on this occasion, his pace in the dying laps of the sprint had notably dipped when the bulk was on show. This also contributed to the fact that his tyres degraded faster than those of pursuer Leclerc.
These factors gave the Monegasque a genuine shot at the spoils in the full GP – more laps were on offer to close the
