Former F1 champion Mike Hakkinen has recently come up to advise Ferrari ahead of their battle against Mercedes for P2 in the season finale. The Italian outfit is just four points behind Mercedes and are looking to put in a strong performance to secure P2 in the standings.
Putting his advice forward, the two-time world champion wrote from his personal X handle, “One reason I always liked going flat out in qualifying, is that starting from the pole makes life a lot easier.”
With this, he further added, “Even if @ScuderiaFerrari can’t keep Max behind in the race, a strong qualifying is a big advantage for them when fighting the WCC 2nd place against @MercedesAMGF1.”
The upcoming battle between the two heavyweight teams is expected to be the biggest talking point in the season-ending race at Abu Dhabi. Since the teams are narrowly pitted against one another, this would make things more mouthwatering for fans to witness.
Nevertheless, the Maranello-based team has the edge over their Brackley rivals ahead of the last race. This is all because of the superior pace advantage and better straight-line speed that could be used in a fast track like Yas Marina. However, both teams are gearing up to their best as P2 is, of course, an essential result for both teams.
How are Ferrari and Mercedes gearing up for one last time in 2023?
As this weekend will see Ferrari take on Mercedes –something they have seen in Abu Dhabi as well last year – Toto Wolff and Fred Vasseur have been doing their best to make their teams prepare well for an extra $10 million prize.
Wolff, on Mercedes’ preparation, revealed to Sky Sports following the conclusion of the Las Vegas GP, “It’s all down to the last weekend. They are very quick, they have done a good job. I think we could have been on par [in the Las Vegas race] but the result shows something different. So let’s race.”
On the other hand, Vasseur seemed to be a little more confident about his team’s chances in the UAE. He said, “We were able to perform in Monza, in Singapore, in Austin, in Mexico, during this weekend on different tracks with different race conditions, different [tire] compounds, and we can be more than motivated before Abu Dhabi. The momentum is for us and let’s see what happens.”
Notably, the battle between McLaren and Aston Martin for P4 is also expected to get feisty as they have very just 11 points difference between themselves. Therefore, these teams also have very high chances to get into the mix next season.
Coming back to the Ferrari versus Mercedes duel, both teams are expected to focus on the radical changes for the upcoming seasons during all of winter. Therefore, they would look to adopt a new concept under the current regulations and look to boost their challenge against Red Bull in 2024.
