MADRID, 4 Nov. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Spanish driver Carlos Sainz (Ferrari) admitted that he had “had to lift his foot off the accelerator a lot” this Saturday “on the straights” of the Autódromo José Carlos Pace, during the sprint race of the Sao Paulo Grand Prix (Brazil) of Formula 1, with the aim of “protecting the engine temperature”.
“At the beginning we suffered a lot with the engine temperature. We had to lift a lot on the straights and protect the engine temperature. I was going half a second or a second per lap slower than what we could do because of the temperatures, which perhaps “They surprised us,” Sainz told DAZN, after finishing eighth in that short race of the twenty-first and penultimate round of the World Championship.
“Then I already lost the DRS train and, when you lose it, you start to use a lot more tire because you have to try to recover what you lose on the straights. And towards the end I have already lost a lot, but I hope that tomorrow goes better because, if No, we have a long race ahead of us,” stressed the Madrid driver.
In addition, he was happy to have “saved all the good tires” on his team for Sunday’s long race. “So today we expected to suffer. The AlphaTauri go with a new tire that helps them a lot and then looking ahead to tomorrow I simply hope that we don’t have to suffer with the temperatures, because that is what made us lose everything today”, he concluded.