Vasseur: It is necessary to understand what we did wrong.

      The main theme of the Italian press publications after the Austrian Grand Prix is well captured by a sentence from a text that appeared this morning in the pages of Gazzetta dello Sport: "It has been only two weeks since Ferrari's triumph in Barcelona, and we are back to harsh reality."

      At the Red Bull Ring, Lewis Hamilton finished fifth, while Charles Leclerc only managed eighth. Naturally, Frederic Vasseur, the head of Scuderia, is dissatisfied with such results, and here are his explanations, which aired on Sky Sports:

      "From the very beginning of the season, we have been lagging behind due to a less efficient engine – we knew about this then, and we know it now. Even the upgrades within the ADUO program are not a magic wand, and it is impossible to change the situation overnight. We will achieve improvements, but it always takes time, and when it comes to the engine, the process takes even longer.

      In addition to the lack of pace, we must admit that when we have to fight with other cars, the problems only worsen because the competitors overtake us on the straights. However, all this cannot serve as an excuse, as we achieved our goals at the previous stage of the season. This means that in Austria, we simply could not put everything together.

      It is regrettable, but I do not think our pace allowed us to compete with Mercedes; however, overall, we could have handled things better. Charles Leclerc wanted to complete the race with two pit stops, but then we changed our plans, and that was the wrong decision.

      At the beginning of the first stint, we attacked too aggressively, causing the tires to lose effectiveness quickly. The mistake was that we paid too much attention to Mercedes, even though in these conditions we lacked the pace to compete with them. If we had taken a different approach, we could have overtaken both McLaren cars.

      It was clear from the start that the Red Bull Ring is a challenging track for us. There are many more combinations of fast corners in Barcelona, which suited our car much better. But every weekend has its own story: conditions change, the temperature background shifts, and all of this affects the competitive landscape.

      At the previous stage, Mercedes had problems, but now they have won again. The reality is that the results of six or seven cars are within just two-tenths of a second, so it is quite normal for certain track characteristics and specific conditions to suit some better than others.

      During the preparations for Silverstone, we must react and take measures. We need to understand what exactly we did wrong. But I believe that we did not work optimally starting from Friday, and we had to pay for that."