The end of endless pit stops at Sauber?

This season, when we talk about Sauber, we almost only talk about their completely botched pit stops. This recurring problem causes the Swiss team to lose crucial potential while the leading teams only leave crumbs here and there. Ahead of the Chinese Grand Prix, Sauber team representative Alessandro Alunni Bravi provided more details about the complicated stops his drivers endure in each race.

🚨TOP 10 SLOWEST PITSTOPS

Bottas (Bahrain): 52.44s
Ricciardo (Jeddah): 41.61s
Bottas (Australia): 31.18s
Zhou (Jeddah): 28.71s
Zhou (Australia): 20.20s
Or with (Australia): 14.71s
Hulkenberg (Bahrain): 14.35s
Sergeant (Bahrain): 13.54s
gasly (Bahrain): 8.03s
Zhou (Japan): 5.43s pic.twitter.com/euOjk5itcr

— Holiness (@F1BigData) April 17, 2024

At a press conference, the Italian claimed that the problem in the pits was due to defective equipment. Therefore, it took Sauber some time to find a solution. Solution which should arrive in the coming weeks, in Imola (May 17-19).

“We have to redesign some parts and, of course, when you have to redesign it, the manufacturing process takes time. We immediately took into account the problem in Bahrain, we start to redesign the parts, and now we are in the manufacturing process. There is a certain lead time for these parts which does not only depend on our in-house production department. And of course, Imola is the goal. »

Do not confuse speed and precipitation

In the Swiss clan, the idea is clear: aim for consistency and cleanliness during stops and not the speed record. The ambition is to transform this weakness into strength, with the arrival of new tools in the stands.

" The constancy ? This is our goal, continues Alessandro Alunni Bravi. We work hard to Hinwil (Swiss) to resolve these problems. In the last race, unfortunately, we lost the opportunity to score points during the second pit stop with Valtteri, because we arrived in front tsunoda and we rejoined the track after four drivers, so we know there is a problem. »

During the Chinese Grand Prix, Sauber has already planned to apply certain measures that could alleviate their ills, without explaining what the exact changes are compared to previous Grands Prix.

With the Sprint qualification, we saw that the C44 had potential this weekend and could hope to get into the points, whether Saturday or Sunday. For the sprint race, there will be no stopping, undoubtedly to the great pleasure of Valtteri Bottas and Guanyu Zhou.

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