Carlos Sainz Should Bounce Back From Brazil’s Harrowing Result

Dust has settled over the Brazilian Grand Prix of 2024. It was a race to forget not just from Carlos Sainz’s point of view, but even from Ferrari’s point of view. Not even a podium and then, a top five finish with Charles Leclerc bagging a low-key fifth was perhaps not the best of weekends for the Italian stable.

However, what was most saddening from a Ferrari point of view was their most recent Formula 1 Grand Prix winner Carlos Sainz jr. ending his Interlagos weekend with a DNF next to his name.

Certainly not the type of race weekend that Carlos Sainz, also race winner at Australia earlier this year (lest it is forgotten) would have expected.

Isn’t that right?

But having said that, truth be told, it’s one thing to have a DNF against your name and something quite other to bounce back to a position of prominence in the very next race.

And speaking of the next F1 Grand Prix, that is precisely what Carlos Sainz would expect, especially with the desire to score more since his Mexico win but unfortunately race retiring at the Senna-land. Having said that, where it might get a little tricky for the Madrid-born Spanish driver is that where it comes to the destination that is next on our calendars, Carlos Sainz would do well to remember him at the Las Vegas.

To most people, Mumbai is the city that doesn’t sleep but that’s only until you step foot in Las Vegas. And last year, which we all know was the maiden F1 Grand Prix of Las Vegas, Carlos Sainz, who but obviously made his debut at Vegas, endured a hard race.

It really wasn’t a race to remember.

As a matter of fact, it was anything but. Why so? Lest it is forgotten, Carlos Sainz jr. had a pretty dull race weekend under the sparkly and simmering lights of Nevadan desert thanks to a sedate race weekend that would culminate in a lowly P6.

Surely, for a driver of his magnitude of talent and irrepressible skill, a sixth was not the kind of result that the 2024 Mexican Grand Prix winner would have expected?

Forget not that while the usually fast and efficient Sainz finished sixth, all he could do was to see his teammate, Charles Leclerc capture a blazing second. It was a memorable result for Ferrari, who do have legions of fans in the American heartland.

But when both Ferrari drivers would have cut an imposing figure on the podium, to see just one among them with the celebratory champagne with the other with a sixth to his name didn’t seem exciting.

Not one bit.

But then Carlos Sainz had a weekend at the Las Vegas street track that had had its own complications from the word go. Now, how is that?

He was the driver who had run over a manhole cover. Remember?

In what were unusual and unforeseen circumstances, Sainz, who by the way beat Leclerc in his maiden season with the Scuderia (2021), a fact that’s often under appreciated, had run over an open manhole cover. And resultantly, Carlos Sainz had to use a fifth internal combustion engine and third control electronics, which saw him incur a grid penalty for exceeding the power unit component. That incident, unfortunate that it may have been, saw him struck with a 10-place grid penalty.

His race was, hence, compromised from the start. Still, that he would end in sixth was a good recovery. So as Carlos Sainz heads to his as also the grid’s second-ever Las Vegas Grand Prix, he would be well advised to play it safe and not end up in man hole covers!