What a rollercoaster of a race weekend it turned out to be for the Tifosi at Monza. Ferrari‘s SF-23 looked very quick right from the practice sessions through to the race on Sunday. Qualifying was where Carlos Sainz exploited his car’s capabilities to the maximum and trumped Max Verstappen by 13 thousandths of a second to secure pole position. But a former Ferrari boss has highlighted why the promise showed by the Spaniard on Saturday didn’t translate into a race win on Sunday. And the reason was the reigning World Champion’s smart tactics.

As soon as the lights went out, Sainz got a decent start and managed to stay ahead of Verstappen by Turn 1. After that, there was no looking back for at least 15 laps. Or was there? Well, there was a lot of looking behind because the Dutchman never let Sainz capitalize on his lead. He limited the gap to less than a second, mostly staying within 4-tenths of him. Consequently, the pressure kept building and Sainz made his first mistake, locking up at Turn 1 and losing the race lead. According to ex-Ferrari Boss, Peter Windsor, this constant pressure by the 2x champion is what led to his eventual win. Unfortunately for Windsor, his prediction of Sainz being quicker came wrong.

On his YouTube channel, Windsor said, “Max Verstappen was always in his mirrors and that’s what won Max the race today. He quite quickly, very early on in the race pushed Carlos into a position where he couldn’t really do any tire management and all he could do was sort of look in his mirrors and try and defend from about 6 laps onwards albeit with that top speed advantage.”

He elaborated, saying, “As I say, Red Bull did get on the radio to Max at some point, said, ‘rear tires are going off, Max. Let’s make a move.’ And Max replied, ‘this thing is really quick in a straight line,’ as we said yesterday.”

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Sainz might have had to settle for P3. But the support from Ferrari’s home crowd didn’t let him feel the downside.

Despite losing the Italian GP, Tifosi’s support keeps Carlos Sainz buoyant.

It might have been Max Verstappen’s day on Sunday. But Carlos Sainz showed immense courage and terrific race-craft throughout the weekend. And the podium finish for him was well-deserved. It might not be as special as a race win, but the fans were ecstatic nonetheless.

After the Italian GP, Sainz said, “It was a great weekend all along and to be able to celebrate a podium with the Tifosi is the perfect icing on the cake! I really want to thank every single one of them for their endless support. They are very special! Today I did everything I could to try to keep both Red Bulls behind, using my tyres to the limit and pushing for the entire race. Unfortunately, they still have the edge over us on race day and P3 was the maximum today.”

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It was great to see the iconic Ferrari team at the front of the grid once again. If they can continue these kinds of performances, the revival of the team might not be far away.