Carlos Sainz Jr is set to get his first taste of Ferrari Formula 1 machinery in a private test ahead of the official 2021 pre-season testing.
But with the preparations for the new season significantly reduced for 2021 to save costs with the largely carried over designs from last year, he and the other F1 drivers making team changes over the winter will have much less time than usual to prepare with their new teams.
On this episode of the Autosport podcast, host Alex Kalinauckas asks Autosport F1 reporter Luke Smith and Motorsport.com’s F1 editor Jonathan Noble what impact this could have on Sainz’s first season going up against Charles Leclerc at Ferrari.
The team also review the official news that Davide Brivio has joined Alpine as racing director and examine whether Max Verstappen’s claims about Red Bull continuing to dominate F1 had the move to use hybrid engines not happened stack up.