Ferrari revealed that it used a ‘dummy’ radio message to trick Red Bull into making a mistake and helping Charles Leclerc secure the P2 position in the 2022 championship.
Red Bull’s Sergio Perez and Leclerc, both entered the final race of the season on equal points battling for P2.
While the Mexican driver’s P2 finish would have brought his team the long-awaited one-two finish in the championship, Leclerc’s P2 finish would have secured the runner-up position in both the constructors’ and drivers’ championship.
But Red Bull’s one mistake cost them the P2 finish and the Scuderia revealed after the race that it tricked the Milton-Keynes-based team into it.
Eventually, as the racing at the Yas Marina Circuit came to an end, Leclerc stormed to secure the P2 finish in the standings thanks to the perfect strategy calls and execution made by the Italian camp and a stupendous performance by the Monegasque driver.
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Ferrari dummied Red Bull into making a mistake
During the middle phase of racing at the Yas Marina Circuit, the Mexican driver was running in second place.
Ferrari knew that the RB18 has more pace than its F1-75 and the only chance of getting past Perez was through strategy.
Ferrari’s strategy calls had been criticised all year long but at the Abu Dhabi GP, Ferrari implemented the perfect strategy by forcing Perez into a two-stop.
While running around the track on lap 33, Ferrari told Leclerc, “Box opposite Red Bull”, giving an impression that the team was planning to undercut Perez to get ahead.
Little did the Red Bull team know that the Italian camp was tricking them into making a double pit stop. Because Leclerc was long committed to a one-stop strategy and his team only made it look like they were going for a two-stop.
Ferrari did everything perfect
As the race proceeded, Ferrari succeeded in tricking the constructors’ champions. Red Bull pitted Perez immediately to cover the Ferrari and lost ground.
The Mexican driver finished 1.3 seconds behind Leclerc on P3. Talking about the strategy call after the race, the Ferrari driver said that the team did exactly what the plan was.
He was proud of the execution and doing everything perfectly especially after having been flooded by criticism throughout the year.
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