BATTERY ISSUES HURT THE PERFORMANCE OF FERRARI IN QUALY
Ferrari drivers Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton faced problems with their car’s energy deployment during qualifying for the season-opening race in Melbourne.
After the session, Leclerc explained that the issue was linked to how the car manages its battery power from one lap to the next. According to him, the system learns from the previous lap and adjusts how it deploys energy.
Leclerc said Ferrari had a problem with this system during Q2. Although the team managed to fix it before Q3, the situation was still not ideal.
“I don’t think it’s specific to us,” Leclerc told Sky Sport UK. “With these cars, we’ve seen on the GPS traces that from one lap to another the teams use different deployment strategies.”
He explained that the car normally learns how to deploy energy based on the previous lap. However, the issue in Q2 and a red flag during Q3 meant Ferrari did not have enough good data to optimize the system.
Because of that, the team had to rely on information from Q1 when entering the final session.
“So coming into Q3 we weren’t exactly optimal, and that cost us some lap time,” Leclerc said.
Lewis Hamilton reported a similar loss of power during Q2, confirming that both Ferrari drivers experienced the same problem.
Data shared by analyst HolinessF1 showed another sign of the issue. During their fastest laps in Q3, both Ferrari cars were about 8 km/h slower than the Haas cars, even though they use the same Ferrari power unit.
The problem likely cost Ferrari valuable time during qualifying. The team will now hope to solve the issue before the race and fight back during the Grand Prix in Melbourne.
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