Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur has pledged that the Scuderia will arrive at the upcoming Spanish Grand Prix in Madrid brimming with "all the energy" needed to rebound from what he described as a "failure" at Monza. The Italian outfit entered their home race with lofty expectations after both Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc posted impressive lap times in Friday's practice sessions. Yet the weekend quickly unraveled, beginning with a qualifying session that saw neither driver secure a front‑row start and culminating in a lackluster race on Sunday. Hamilton, who had qualified fourth, was forced down the order after a side‑by‑side battle with Leclerc at the first chicane.
The contact sent Hamilton onto the gravel at Turn 2, a moment he later expressed dissatisfaction with. Meanwhile, Leclerc suffered a dramatic crash on the third lap, destroying his car and leaving the Monegasque driver with temporary eye irritation. Although Hamilton managed to climb back to third place at one stage, he never found the outright pace to challenge the leaders and ultimately crossed the line in sixth, trailing both Mercedes drivers, Red Bull’s Max Verstappen and the two McLaren entries.
"We will come to Madrid with all the energy that we need to do a good result," Vasseur said in the post‑race press conference. "It’s true that Monza, for us, even if I spend the week saying it was a normal race, it was not, as you can imagine. With all the Tifosi, we were expecting to give them something else as a big thank you for the support and the enthusiasm that they have. We all feel we have failed in some way, but be sure that we will come back much stronger." Ferrari introduced their second and final power‑unit upgrade of the season at Monza, yet the cars remained slower than the Mercedes‑powered rivals on the long straights.
Straight‑line speed has been Ferrari’s Achilles heel throughout the year, a deficiency that Vasseur believes will be less pronounced on the twisty, technical layout of the new Madring circuit in Madrid. He admitted he did not anticipate being able to close the power‑unit gap to Mercedes in a single event.
"When you lack pure power, you start to play with deployment to try to compensate on the straights," Vasseur explained. "But if you deploy more in one place, you have to deploy less elsewhere, and that puts you in a negative spiral when you’re fighting wheel‑to‑wheel.
Honestly, it’s not just about deployment. Even McLaren was tweaking their strategy on Friday and Saturday.
In the end, we are missing pure power." Earlier this year, after the first Additional Development and Upgrade Opportunities (ADUO) review, Ferrari was found to be more than four per cent off the benchmark set by Red Bull’s power unit. This gap allowed the Scuderia to pursue two engine upgrades during the current season and granted them an additional development window for the 2027 power unit, when a brand‑new engine will be introduced.
"The engine development process is incredibly long," Vasseur noted. "You can upgrade the chassis from one day to the next and see immediate gains, but the engine is a different story. Lead times for parts are extensive and the cost cap makes it difficult – you have to produce an engine that will last the entire season. If you want to start development, you need to manufacture a new batch of engines.
We don’t expect to recover fully with ADUO 1 or ADUO 2; we are taking small, incremental steps." He added that even a modest increase in horsepower can translate into a significant positional advantage on the grid. "If you make a small step on the engine, keep in mind that behind us, it was hundredths of a second. In terms of position, even a couple of extra horsepower is a good step on the grid. Next year we will have a new engine, and the target is to catch up as soon as possible." The Spanish Grand Prix weekend schedule is packed with action.
On Thursday, September 10, the drivers’ press conference will take place at 2 p.m., followed by the paddock uncut at 5 p.m. Friday, September 11, features F3 practice at 8:50 a.m., F2 practice at 10 a.m., and the first Spanish Grand Prix practice session at 12:30 p.m., with qualifying for F2 at 12:55 p.m.
The team bosses’ press conference is slated for 2:40 p.m., and a second practice session begins at 4 p.m., followed by F3 qualifying at 5:20 p.m. and the F1 Show at 6:20 p.m. Saturday, September 12, kicks off with the F3 sprint at 10 a.m., the third practice session for the Grand Prix at 11:30 a.m., the F2 sprint at 1:10 p.m., and the build‑up to qualifying at 2:15 p.m.
The Spanish Grand Prix qualifying session starts at 3 p.m., with the F3 Feature Race 1 at 4:55 p.m. and Ted’s Qualifying Notebook at 6 p.m. Sunday, September 13, sees the F3 Feature Race 2 at 8:40 a.m., the F2 Feature Race at 10:20 a.m., and the Grand Prix build‑up at 12:30 p.m.
The main event, the Spanish Grand Prix, begins at 2 p.m., followed by the chequered flag ceremony at 4 p.m. and post‑race reactions at 5 p.m., concluding with Ted’s Notebook.
All sessions will be broadcast live on Sky Sports F1, with streaming available via NOW – no contract required, cancel anytime. Ferrari fans can look forward to a fresh start in Madrid, hoping that the combination of a more suitable circuit and the team’s renewed determination will finally translate the Scuderia’s potential into podium finishes.