Is the risk that Mercedes took with Antonelli paying off?

In a McLaren one-two, Oscar Piastri defeated teammate Lando Norris to claim the victory in Miami, bringing the three victories in a row to three.

Norris now leads Piastri in the drivers’ championship by 16 points.

Meanwhile, Ferrari were embroiled in a controversy over team orders after Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc were both asked to swap positions.

What on earth is wrong with Ferrari, exactly? – Jonathan

Following the Miami Grand Prix, Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc’s team-order debate dominated the news conference of Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur.

Vasseur expressed some resentment toward this, saying in the end, “It’s not the story of the day,” noting that the only difference was the driver’s seventh and eighth-place finish.

“I would be much more keen to speak about why we finished one minute behind McLaren”, he said.

Ferrari paid the price for their poor grid positions, according to Vasseur, who claimed that the car’s pace was comparable to that of Max Verstappen’s and Mercedes-Benz. He acknowledged that McLaren was “on another planet.”

Charles Leclerc qualified eighth and Lewis Hamilton 12th, Ferrari’s worst qualifying result of the season, and that was largely because they were struggling to get the best out of new tyres.

In the second set of qualifying, Hamilton and Leclerc ran on second-hand tires. Everyone improved between 0. 5 and 0. 6 seconds between being scrubbed and new, according to Vasseur, and we lost 0. 2 to 0. 3 seconds.

Asked why Ferrari struggled with tyres in Miami, he said: “That’s a good question. We would have fixed it between Q2 and Q3 if I knew the solution.

You must operate the tires in a very small window, they say. It’s different from track to track, it’s different from compound to compound, from track temp to track temp. And you always respond, “OK, I could have done something else,” after the session. ” “

But that was just Miami. Ferrari’s overall problem is that, after running McLaren so close to winning the constructors’ title last year, the car is not where it should be.

Ferrari simply needs to make the car faster, especially McLaren, which made more progress over the winter.

On average, it is the slowest of the top four teams, and Ferrari have scored only one grand prix podium, thanks to Leclerc in Saudi Arabia.

Hamilton and the team appeared to have found a good setup after just one practice session in China, while others did not, and then gained from fresh air at the start of the race.

Lewis did an outstanding job, Leclerc once said. Maybe some drivers didn’t put everything together in (sprint) qualifying and he managed to do that and managed to outperform the car a bit.

When you start in front, everything comes to you a little more, with tire degradation being a big deal. On Friday and Saturday, Lewis made a difference.

There are what Vasseur calls “some small upgrades” coming at the next two races in Imola and Monaco. Vasseur hopes that the stricter front wing deflection regulations that will be implemented at the following race in Spain will help.

In Barcelona, he declared, “Everyone will have a new front wing.” “By definition and by regulation. Perhaps it will be a resumption of everyone’s performance, in my opinion.

The result is that McLaren can profit from exploiting this phenomenon. McLaren themselves say they expect it to make little difference to them.

After challenging initials, Ferrari made good progress with upgrades in both 2023 and 2024. Vasseur is confident that this year they can do the same.

Is the risk that Mercedes took bringing Kimi Antonelli into the team now rather than later paying off? – Callum

Kimi Antonelli’s debut Formula 1 season started out well, and he claimed his strategy was to build slowly and avoid making major errors.

In Miami, the 18-year-old for the first time showed a glimpse of the high potential Mercedes believed him to have, and which persuaded them to throw him in at the deep end this year.

He was a confident driver from the beginning and consistently led the Mercedes over a lap.

Pole’s outstanding performance in the sprint race earned him a third place finish on the grid for the grand prix. Neither race went as well, but team principal Toto Wolff believes that was evidence of Antonelli’s continued need to learn in the complex world of F1.

Wolff referred to the qualifying performances as “another example of his talent and a promising future outlook.”

It’s challenging in the race because it’s so challenging to locate the appropriate reference here. The medium (tyre) stint, quick enough, you know, with George (Russell) holding on in the back on the hard tyre.

“And then, when he entered the difficult, he simply lacked the necessary experience to manage it.”

“We’re trying to guide him and find the appropriate references, but it’s not simple to do that in that car.” It’s just part of the learning curve”.

Wolff has always said that Antonelli’s adaptation to F1 will take time, which is exactly how it is going.

Given that he hasn’t yet scored a single point, how can Fernando Alonso turn things around? – Andrew

It’s fair to say that Fernando Alonso is not having his best season, and it’s highly unusual to see that he has scored no points while team-mate Lance Stroll has scored 14 points and is 10th in the championship.

The Aston Martin is a poor car overall. Despite making a few errors, Alonso and Stroll have both had positive effects from the circumstances.

Alonso is still comfortably faster than the Canadian – the two-time champion is 7-1 ahead across all qualifying sessions at an average advantage of 0.321 seconds.

He crashed on gravel at Turn Six despite being well-versed in the wet and finishing sixth overall in Australia. Stroll’s strong driving and maneuverability helped her move up and take sixth place because of the chaos in the race.

Stroll then benefited from the disqualification of both Ferraris in China, and was promoted to ninth place. Alonso immediately retired there, his brakes in gear.

Stroll benefited from the chaos in the Miami Sprint, where Alonso was safely driving and on point when he was struck by Liam Lawson.

His spin in the grand prix, while uncharacteristic, “didn’t change anything”, he said.

“I lost five seconds, and then ten more seconds later, I caught the same group of cars, stayed put, and then profited from the virtual safety car.”

Even with that, today’s cars aren’t moving as fast as the cars in front. We need to get better for Imola. Despite our best efforts, we are all trying to keep our pace at this.

Andy Cowell, the Aston Martin team manager, praised Alonso’s outstanding and impressive qualifying performance in Jeddah. But with no retirements, Alonso finished just out of the points in both races.

The car is actually eighth fastest on average in qualifying, and it was fastest in Miami. Therefore, it’s always challenging to get points.

Cowell said in Miami that Aston Martin were” not a happy camp and we’re trying to work out (what has gone wrong) “.

Aston Martin had rejected Alonso’s request for a previous change to slicks in the Saturday sprint in Miami, but Alonso expressed disappointment and said, “I am trying to do my best behind the wheel.”

“I nailed Japan, P11,” the singer said. Jeddah was nearly perfect. When chaos occurs, you have three or four chances to score points, as I previously mentioned.

“Two people were present this year already. Australia, and I had the mistake and went on the gravel and went off. I had my brakes on fire on lap one in China, with three or four cars disqualified.

“And yesterday the track had dry tires, and we stuck to the inters for too long.”