Ferstappen: “Ferrari is very close to us”

Max Ferstappen and Christian Horner have different views on Ferrari – the Dutchman says he is very close and the latter is superior to the RBR – but agree that the Scuderia is back at the top of Formula 1.

The opening of this year’s Formula 1 championship with the Free Trials of the Bahrain GP was no different from the Winter Trials: Ferrari was the protagonist again – and in this case Charles Leclerc approached Max Ferstappen with 87 milliseconds, which was the first year day marked of the year.

Although free testing does not allow any firm conclusions as to each team’s capacity as each car’s fuel quantity and engine mode remains unknown, the two RBR leaders are now confident that Ferrari has entered the battle for the top spot this year.

“We see that Ferrari are pushing very hard and are very close, but that’s also very exciting“said Ferstappen. He added that his RB18 is in very good condition:
“Things are looking good. I am very happy with our car. It made me feel good. We tried a few things and everything seemed to work fine“.

At the same time, the champion is undeterred by Mercedes’ bad times, even though the W13 was one of the slowest cars on Shakir’s track top odometer. Due to this fact, the Dutchman believes that last year’s big opponent didn’t have the strongest engine mode today.

“We’ll have to wait until we see the engine modes from all the teams tomorrow to find out where we are. I don’t think everyone is in qualifying yet so we’ll have to see what happens tomorrow when everyone turns their engines to full power‘ he said explicitly.

Back at Ferrari, RBR director Christian Horner sees the Scuderia not only close to Red Bull, but a step ahead: “I think Ferrari was very, very fast. You could see that with both drivers today. “All winter long they seemed impressive going out on the track,” said the Brit.

And he continued: “It’s not that important to me who our opponents will be. It’s great to see Ferrari back in action. He’d been a sleeping giant for the past two years, and the time would come when things would be all right. You started this program very early and presented a great car. And I’m very happy for our people. After last year’s intensity, they managed to build a remarkable car that we can continue to develop throughout the season“.

At the same time, Sergio Perez’s poor recent performance seems to run counter to Ferstappen and the team’s optimism for the new RB18, but Horner clarified that Max’s gap of more than a second to the Mexican was due to him trying some different and mechanical components .