Carlos Sainz showing "full potential" after "nailing" fifth in France

Carlos Sainz claimed fifth on the grid in France — Photo: © LAT Images

French Grand Prix

Sainz showing "full potential" after "nailing" fifth in France

Ferrari driver out-qualified team-mate Charles Leclerc

Will Gray

Saturday 19 June 2021 18:17

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Carlos Sainz feels he was finally able to show his “full potential” at Ferrari after “nailing” his qualifying laps at the French Grand Prix to out-qualify team-mate Charles Leclerc and finish ‘best of the rest’ behind the top two teams.

Sainz, who joined Ferrari this season, has missed out on completing his final Q3 runs at the last two events due to late-session stoppages but this time he got a clean lap in and finished 0.157 seconds ahead of Leclerc.

Asked if he had finally got to grips with the Ferrari he said: “Honestly the last three weekends, Monaco, Baku and here, I have been feeling very strong [but] this is the first clean quail I’ve done in the three weekends.

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“It’s the first quail where I’ve managed to show my true potential and the true potential of the car with me, so after two frustrating quails, to get one clean one, just nailing the laps through qualifying, felt definitely good.

“I think it was about time because I was starting to get a bit frustrated.”

After flying high at the last two rounds – where Leclerc claimed pole for both – Ferrari dropped back down to earth this weekend and Sainz’s lap was some 0.850s off the pace-setting time of Max Verstappen.

Sainz unlocks pace without Ferrari upgrades

Sainz revealed the team had not made any significant developments since the start of the season, due to the focus being placed on preparing for the new 2022 regulations, but that gains are being made through ‘tweaks’ in the design.

He added: “So far this year apart from bringing fine tunings to the car, no big upgrades, all the focus is onto next year, we want to do the next step next year.

“So far this year we’ve managed to progress just by understanding the car, changing very little bits on the car that’s made it a bit quicker every race weekend.

“Monaco and Baku surprised us, particularly Baku. In Bahrain we saw we had a really strong car in low speed, Baku had a very long straight and we thought we were going to go backwards.

“Here we’re unfortunately back to where we were before Monaco and Baku, which is those six, seven-tenths behind the leaders, but it’s still good progress compared to where we were last year.”