The Miami Grand Prix was delivered across multiple fronts and offered one of the great race weekends with many talkative points.
The big ones that don’t have to cover up that underlying cause are related to teams not approaching the podium on Sunday.
Lewis Hamilton’s radio message asked Ferrari to exchange positions between himself and Charles Leclair, the latter being the highlight of the highlight compared to the medium Hamilton was running on the hard tire.
Ferrari tried to do his best with the driver two seconds later with Carlos Sainz, but Kimi Antonelli could potentially get five seconds ahead – Hamilton complained when he was first told to hold the position. Hamilton responded ironically after the team told him they would make a swap.
Hamilton looked frustrated when Ferrari was taking to make the decision, so after he returned the position to Leclair, there was a tongue message after he also joked whether he should go through Sainz.
“It wasn’t even angry,” Hamilton said of his message. “It wasn’t something like ‘effect’ or ‘blind’ or anything like that. “Make a decision! You sit on a chair and have something in front of you. Make your decision quickly. That’s how I was.
“Yeah, I mean, it was at least everything PG, right?! I don’t know what you’re writing, if I’m rude or what it was. Honestly, I’m not. I still lit my stomach.
“I’m not going to apologise for being a fighter, I’m not going to apologise for wanting it yet. I know that everyone on the team is doing that too. And when we fix some of the issues we have with our cars, we really believe we’ll be back in the fight against Mercedes and come back with the Bulls.
“We’re going to try something different in the next race. We’re going to keep working on the process. We might be able to compete for the podium. That’s great.”
The focus was on complaints from both Ferrari drivers about how the race was handled, but one of the two main areas of concern that will come over the weekend seemed to be seeing progress. Both drivers were fighting for the same position on the track, so team orders were required. Hamilton was a bit helped by the timing of his virtual safety car, but he showed a pace that rivaled his teammates.
Two weeks ago, it was far from Saudi Arabia. Hamilton was very downbeat and could not play the car in a way he was pleased with. Leclair later took the podium, but Hamilton came in seventh, but his seventh place this time was comparable to what Leclair could achieve.
“I really enjoyed the race,” he said. “This weekend isn’t as fast as we hoped, but it generally feels like the weekend has gotten better. The results may not necessarily show that today, but I was 12th. It was very difficult to pass here.
“All I could see was ahead and we thought we could probably get to the sixth or something. We lost a lot of time on the laps that Charles and I were fighting for, and it was obviously faster in that moment.
“It’s true, at the time, you said, ‘Come on!” But I don’t think that’s really a problem with the team.
That’s a major area of concern for Ferrari. Hamilton’s two identical P7 finishes made a completely different response from the driver and a completely different response from team principal Fred Vasser.
“Fred came to my room,” Hamilton said. “I put my hand on his shoulder and said, ‘Hey, I’m calm. Don’t be so sensitive.’ I might have said something worse on the radio – you hear some of the things other people have said in the past.
“Look, you have to understand that we are under great pressure in our cars. You will never pass through the most peaceful message in the heat of battle.”
However, the report would be much more painful for Ferrari, as he was beaten fairly comfortably by Alex Albon’s Williams and Mercedes drivers and Max Verstappen. But as with all tracking packs, the real gap that needs to be addressed is McLaren.
Mercedes and Red Bull are concerned about a 30-minute deficit, but for Ferrari, the margin to McLaren was almost one minute. Vasseur admits that in the chatter around the team’s radio messages, it is an outcome that is not allowed to be lost in any way.
“I discussed it with Lewis and I can fully understand frustration,” Vasuzer said. “They are champions and they want to win the race. We ask them to let go of the team. It’s not easy. It’s never easy. I didn’t see any other teams to do it today.
“That’s why we were responsible for doing that, because that’s the policy for the team. We competed against Ferrari in the first place. Honestly, I think we did a good job as a team.
“Again, I can argue that it’s better to do a half-lap before or half-lap after lap later. But when you’re on the wall of the pit and have to understand whether the car behind you is faster than the car in front of you, it’s not just a simple call, not just for the DRS.
“It’s always much easier to do that two hours later. We asked them to do it, they did it. Now, the frustration when you’re in the car, I can fully understand this.
“It’s not about that day. We did a P6-7 instead of a P7-6, P6-7 or P7-6. We’re even more enthusiastic about why we finished a minute after McLaren.”
Vasseur clearly doesn’t avoid that, but it’s a much more difficult topic than radio communications with drivers, and a very difficult gap to head towards one of Imola’s Ferrari’s home grand prix next time.