Sainz on Red Bull: 'Doing something with tyres that we don't understand'

Carlos Sainz failed to score a podium in Bahrain. The Spaniard saw his compatriot Fernando Alonso come alongside in the closing stages, although that was no surprise to him. The Ferrari driver knows there is work to be done, as he simply lacked speed during the season opener.

"It's a bit of our reality right now," Sainz acknowledged. On tyres, like last year, the SF23 is still not great. "We just push in the race, as you saw in my battle with Fernando it nearly cost me a position to Lewis because as soon as we push on these tyres we go backwards and start degrading. Clearly our biggest point of weakness."

During long runs, Ferrari couldn't match Red Bull Racing and Aston Martin. "Clearly Aston and Red Bull are doing something to the tyres that we don't fully understand because it's costing us in the race," he said. It was no surprise to see Alonso take third place. "You saw him finish 10 seconds in front so the pace difference was huge. it shows we have work to do there."

Ferrari in Saudi Arabia

Ferrari was almost a second a lap slower than Max Verstappen's RB19, but in a fortnight's time that difference will be a bit less, Sainz told GPblog about it. "I believe we can be more competitive in the Jeddah race, the tarmac allows you to push more. There's less degradation," Sainz said.