Ferrari, from heaven to hell: Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton, disqualified by China

After the great victory of Lewis Hamilton in the Sprint, the long race was an ordeal for the Rossa, there was a touch among the pilots that complicated Charles Leclerc, team orders that caused anger and threw them out of technique.

Ferrari lived a weekend of free fall in the GP of China. No one imagined Sunday’s closure after Lewis Hamilton was the fastest in the classification for Friday Sprint and comfortably won the short competition of Saturday. After a complicated classification for the long race, on Sunday he had team orders that generated spark, a touch between English and Charles Leclerc and, as a climax, the two were disqualified by technique!

If the discouragement reigned in Ferrari’s hosts after the complicated competition in which Leclerc had been fifth and Hamilton, sixth, two hours after the flag of paintings was lowered the final bomb would arrive: The two SF-25 were thrown out of the competition. In the case of Monegasco, for not having given the minimum weight. Instead, English was due to excessive wear of the background (it has to give a minimum measure that was not achieved). Thus, the 18 points that Maranello’s Team had harvested for the builders tournament were erased.

Before the verdict of the technical review of the FIA, and that left them empty, the Rossa weekend had gone from highest to minor. After the great classification for the sprint and the short race, it all began to twist in the performance. To make matters worse, in the first round of the main competition there was a touch among the pilots, which left the front wing broken on the SF-25 of Leclerc. The Monegasco continued like this during the 56 laps that the race had.

On the 20th round, after both runners stopped in boxes, Leclerc traveled with a better rhythm behind Hamilton. And the order to change positions came. “In curve 14”, it was the indication that the heptacampeón received, who decided to fulfill the indication, but in the first variant, and not before showing the disagreement on the radio.

Maranello’s house opted for two different strategies. While Leclerc stopped only once (as they would finally do all those in front), Lewis stopped twice. Nothing modified the situation, the rhythm to fight for the podium was lost. In the end, the Monegasco could not defend himself from the attack by Max Verstappen, who, with a bright maneuver and at the time of better performance of Red Bull (return 53 of 56), finally got fourth and left the Ferrari in the fifth and sixth place from which they had begun, but with inverted positions.

After the race, Hamilton explained the touch with his partner of the initial turn: “I didn’t know that Charles was there, inside. I didn’t see him and I hope it’s the last time we played”. And as for the walk of his SF-25, it was clear: “I was complicated, if I didn’t stop for the second time, anyway, it would have ended in the same position. I tried and did not work, you learn from this. We made changes to the set up and did not walk,” he analyzed.

Leclerc, meanwhile, explained: “I lost a lot of Downforce with the alerón breakage. But it happened in the touch with Lewis, it is frustrating that it occurred between us two.” Many talks will be in Ferrari doors inside until you reach Japan. Apparently in the two played races, La Rossa is far from McLaren, but also one step behind Red Bull and Mercedes.

A weekend he painted for Ferrari resurgence after Fiasco de Australia, he finished badly. With the disqualification, the team adds 17 points in builders, fifth and 61 points of McLaren, the leader. In just two appointments they lost a lot of land.