Sainz reveals Ferrari exit wish to cure 'weakness'

Carlos Sainz has shared what hopes can be a parting gift for when he leaves Ferrari at the end of the current F1 season.

The Spanish driver has not yet determined where he will drive next year, but has identified one weakness with the 2024 Ferrari he wishes to help eradicate prior to moving on to pastures new.

Since his home grand prix, the SF-24 has struggled with bouncing, with both Sainz and team-mate Charles Leclerc unable to get the car into a working window to take advantage of upgrades rolled out at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya.

The issues with the Ferrari became so bad the team opted to revert to a previous specification - the package delivered for the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix in May.

In particular, the Italian team is suffering through high-speed corners, but Sainz explaining that issue problem in itself is nothing new.

"To be honest, we know we have this weakness - we have it since the beginning of the season," the 29-year-old told media including RacingNews365.

"We're doing everything we can to solve it but you need time, and now, I hope that - probably not in the short term but - in the longer term, hopefully before I leave, that we can come up with a proper solution, because it's still not ideal to drive in these kind of corners a bit on the on the edge, but hopefully we've done a step this weekend and we can move on for Spa [Spa-Francorchamps]."

Sainz still 'not convinced' of latest Ferrari specification

Before the Scuderia can get to Belgium to fully access the latest iteration of the SF-24, Sainz and Leclerc must navigate the Hungarian Grand Prix. The pair qualified in fourth and sixth place, respectively.

Whilst the only substantive change brought to Budapest by Ferrari was a re-worked floor underbody, Sainz confirmed that he was running the newest package at the Hungaroring - even if it is still three or four tenths of a second off the ultimate pace, by his own admission.

"I'm not convinced," the three-time grand prix winner replied when asked by RacingNews365 if the current specification car is a better platform to work from than before. 

"I think we need some time to analyse and we need to go to proper high-speed corners, 250[kph], 260. That is where the thing starts getting tricky. 

"Here, 240[kph] to 220 in Turn 11 and 4, and already Q3 I was struggling a bit with bouncing, so we're gonna need to go back and analyse carefully if it's done exactly what we want and see if it's performing a bit better."