Carlos Sainz adds pressure to F1 sprint pole debate

Ferrari

Sainz adds pressure to F1 sprint pole debate

Ferrari driver feels pole loses its historical significance with sprint qualifying format

Will Gray

Friday 23 July 2021 14:52 Updated: 14:56

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Carlos Sainz feels declaring the pole winner based on anything other than the fastest driver over one lap spoils the purity of F1.

The sport introduced the new timetable at Silverstone last weekend, with one practice session on Friday before a traditional qualifying run to decide the positions for Saturday's sprint.

Sainz was one driver that lost grid places in the 17 lap sprint, but he said: “What happened to me could have happened in the grand prix, just because of the position I was starting in and in the end the sprint quali gave me the opportunity to come back from 19th to 10th and start from 10th.

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“So, I am not too uncomfortable with the sprint quali. I just think the pole position should be given to the fastest guy in quali, the pole position should be still an award and a statistic for the future.

“It should be for the fastest guy in quali and not for a guy who does a good start or wins a race. That’s my only thing.

Sainz - Teams should reveal their strategies

Sainz feels the Saturday morning session also needs to be looked at, as the practice was relatively meaningless to fans because they did not know what the teams were working on.

Sainz added: “Maybe we could reveal the fuel loads to make it a bit more exciting for the fans to watch, the compound we are using, basically we have nothing to hide already in Friday on Saturday because there’s Parc Ferme.

“It would be nice for the fans to see a bit what we are trying to do on Saturday morning with our race pace.”

Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto believes the jury is still out on the new format and added: “We need to digest it, I think certainly there are things that can be improved like what can be done for Saturday morning to make it a bit more relevant.

“But overall I think the numbers from the TV audience will be important, so I don’t think we can have a final judgement right now, I think we need to wait the next two opportunities to have a better picture. I think that the mini race, the sprint quali, is a bit strange for me, but I think we need to digest.”