Frederic Vasseur takes positives from Spa weekend as he insists Ferrari are ‘pushing like hell’ to fix costly issue

That became third after the chequered flag, though, thanks to the Mercedes of George Russell getting disqualified for being underweight, with Sainz ultimately taking sixth to contribute to Ferrari’s best Grand Prix points tally since Monte Carlo.

Reflecting on the weekend, and Ferrari’s recent progress, team boss Vasseur said: “The bouncing went well – under control. The performance of the car… I would say that if you finish less than 10 seconds behind the winner in Spa after [44] laps, you can imagine that the pace is decent.

POWER RANKINGS: Which drivers impressed our judges with some brilliant driving in Belgium?

“I’m quite happy with the overall performance, a bit disappointed with the position, I would say, because the target was not to finish P4 and P7. Overall, I think the pace was okay.

“At the end of the day it’s so tight that we are speaking about one or two tenths per lap, or 10 seconds over [44] laps. It means that if you are able to fix a small issue or to make a small step in terms of set-up or whatever, it’s making a huge difference at the end in terms of classification.

“It’s already the good side of the championship today that you have four teams who race, you have six drivers within 10 seconds at the end. This is, for me, mega in Spa.”

But despite the bouncing being “under control” last weekend, Vasseur admits there is more to be done and that further refinements will be coming over the second half of the season – also pointing to a run of tracks where he feels the SF-24 will be back to its best.