“No regrets” for Pier Guidi, second at Imola

A red car was expected to cross the finish line first at the 6 Hours of Imola, but to the great disappointment of the 90,000 Tifosi in attendance, it was a Toyota and not one Classic Ferrari for sale who won. Driver of the No. 51 car, which finished in second position, Alessandro Pier Guidi still sees the positive in this result, as the Ferraris impressed throughout the weekend with their pace, and the 18 points for second place remain very important in view of a championship that the No. 51 car won last year.

“I’m quite satisfied with the result; these are good points for the championship. Of course, we want to win, and we wanted to do it at home in front of our fans, but I’d say we were a bit unlucky at certain points. For example, when the Toyota got in front of us because they hadn’t changed tires, then there was a Virtual Safety Car which allowed everyone to pit and change tires. As a result, our tire advantage was gone, and from that point on, it was impossible to overtake. I spent two stints behind the Toyota, and Giovi did another one after that. With our acceleration and the characteristics of the circuit, it was impossible to pass.”

While the Toyotas opted for triple stints on the Michelin tires available to them, the race could just as easily have swung in Ferrari's hands during the second Virtual Safety Car intervention. The arrival of the No. 7 Toyota, between the No. 8 and No. 51 cars, also played a role, preventing Giovinazzi, Calado, and Pier Guidi from closing the gap to the winning Toyota.

“We were very close, there were small differences, like their decision to do a triple stint; they could have paid the price in the following stints, but with the Virtual Safety Car, our advantage had evaporated. In this kind of race, a bit of luck or bad luck can change a lot when the performances are so close. Even if we had better pace, it would have been impossible to overtake because of the circuit layout and because we aren't very good at acceleration. I was losing a few meters, and I was never close enough under braking. It wasn't possible for me to overtake, but that's how it is.”

While some in the paddock were surprised by Toyota's victory in the TR010 Hybrid's debut, Alessandro Pier Guidi admits he saw this possibility coming. Ferrari, unlike Toyota, decided against making fundamental changes to the 499P; the next seven rounds of the championship will reveal which team has taken the right path.

“Ultimately, we knew, even seeing their performance in Bahrain, they achieved a one-two finish with the old car. Here, I didn't expect them to be slower with the new car! That's normal. It's part of the game, we knew that, we decided to keep the same car, we'll see at the end of the season if it pays off or not. Our car is still good, we showed that today with this second place, but we fought until the very end, we secured pole position, I don't think our car is bad, far from it.”

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