Ferrari: New Le Mans Hypercar off at WEC Prologue “nothing serious”

The damage to the car after the Briton’s off at Turn 1 on his out-lap at the start of second morning of the two-day official pre-season test was largely confined to the right front corner, according to Giuliano Salvi, Ferrari’s sportscar race and testing manager.

“One corner we will have to change, but the rest is pretty small details,” he said. “It was nothing serious for the car or the driver.”

He confirmed there had been no damage to the motor generator unit (MGU) inside the front of the monocoque.

The Ferrari AF Corse team appeared confident on Sunday night that it would not have to rebuild the car around a fresh monocoque, but Salvi stated that the tub was still undergoing final checks.

Salvi explained the decision not to rush to repair the car in order to get it back on track in the afternoon session was related to mileage the #51 Ferrari had achieved on the opening day of the Prologue.

“It was a consequence of having such a smooth day with that car [on Saturday] because we did a huge mileage, almost too much,” he said.

“We were not in need of a full day [on Sunday], because then we would have gone out of phase with our race preparations.”

#51 Ferrari AF Corse Ferrari 499P: Alessandro Pier Guidi, James Calado, Antonio Giovinazzi

Photo by: JEP / Motorsport Images

He added that the team did not want to go beyond the planned mileage going into race week for Friday’s WEC season-opener, the Sebring 1000 Miles.

The #51 Ferrari Calado shared with Alessandro Pier Guidi and Antonio Giovinazzi completed a total of 116 laps of the Sebring International Raceway on Saturday.

Salvi explained that Calado had gone off at Turn 1 when the team was trying a new strategy on leaving the pits on cold rubber as it continues to learn about running without tyre warmers, which have been banned in the WEC this year.

“We can say that the accident was a result of attempting to do something different on the out-lap, almost too different,” he said without going into detail.

Ferrari expressed satisfaction with the work it achieved at the Prologue in which Nicklas Nielsen placed the #50 499P sixth in the combined times after late improvement in the final session.

“We are pleased with the first two days if we take out the small accident,” explained Salvi. “It was like our first day at school, but we did a lot of laps and we are relaxed.”