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In the legendary Temple of Speed at Monza, pure straight-line speed on its own was simply not enough for Ferrari. During a weekend that the Italian team had hoped would finally bring a long-awaited moment of redemption, the engineers and strategists in Maranello decided to gamble heavily on a low-drag and extreme aerodynamic configuration. However, this bold setup choice ended up exposing once again the chronic lack of downforce that has limited the Ferrari SF-25 throughout the 2025 Formula 1 World Championship season. This deficiency prevented the red cars from holding their ground against both Red Bull and McLaren. Let us take a closer look at how this unfolded.
For the thousands of Ferrari fans who filled the grandstands, dressed in red and waving flags, ready to passionately support the Prancing Horse with their usual warmth and enthusiasm, the real surprise at Monza was sadly not Ferrari, but Red Bull. And perhaps this was the bitterest element of the entire weekend: despite the final result of fourth place and sixth place for the two Ferrari drivers, the race in Brianza represented one of the best opportunities of the year to try to wrestle away supremacy from the currently dominant McLaren team.
But reality played out differently. Even at Monza, a historic circuit where aerodynamic efficiency normally takes precedence, Ferrari once again came face to face with its structural limitations. These are the same weaknesses that have compromised its competitiveness throughout most of the season, even on a track that on paper should have suited the car well. Hopes of securing a first victory of the year and giving the tifosi a magical Sunday were effectively extinguished already on Saturday, in a qualifying session where the SF-25 was reduced to the role of bystander.
That moment was the most telling sign: to realistically aim for something more than a fourth and sixth place finish, Ferrari would have needed an unpredictable and chaotic Sunday, a race with sudden plot twists that could overturn the usual order of performance. Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton put all their effort and determination into the first laps, attacking with courage and commitment. However, without some extraordinary outside factor or a dramatic twist of fortune, their chances quickly faded.
Instead, the Italian Grand Prix turned out to be surprisingly straightforward and linear, perhaps even more so than the teams themselves had predicted before the lights went out. All of those variables that had created so much uncertainty the previous year, factors that could have played in Ferrari’s favour, simply failed to appear this time. This left the SF-25 fully exposed and revealed once again the specific areas where it remains lacking compared to its rivals, above all the generation of aerodynamic load.
The concept of downforce has been a recurring theme throughout the 2025 season, and paradoxically it became decisive once again at Monza, a track famous above all for top speeds. And it was precisely this lack of downforce that condemned Ferrari to play a supporting role in a Grand Prix they had hoped to dominate. The early warning signs were already visible in qualifying, but in the race itself, without the artificial help of fresh soft tyres providing extra grip, the weaknesses of the SF-25 became even more evident.
Of course, in the opening laps, both Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton attacked with aggression and generosity, which contributed to tyre overheating at a very delicate stage of the tyre’s life cycle. It took several laps to restore balance in the car’s handling. But ultimately this aspect was of relative importance, since tyre wear and degradation were minimal and did not play a decisive role in the outcome of the race.
In his analysis after the race, Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur referred to a missing “last tenth” in the battle with McLaren. That reading is partly valid if one looks at the single-lap performance on Saturday: the fresh soft tyres had temporarily masked some of the SF-25’s shortcomings, providing grip to a car that was otherwise running with an extremely low-downforce setup. However, the reality on Sunday afternoon over race distance was much more complex, and in the Temple of Speed, simple top speed was not enough to compensate for the lack of grip in the corners.
By analysing the race from lap 20 onwards, after the most delicate phase of tyre temperature management had passed, it became clear exactly where Ferrari was losing ground compared to McLaren and Red Bull. The problem was in the corners, especially in the fast and technical sections such as the Ascari chicane and the Parabolica curve, where stability at turn-in and consistency in mid-corner are absolutely fundamental. In these sections, the Ferrari SF-25 was sometimes slower by as much as 10 to 11 kilometres per hour.
The notable advantage on the straights — with the SF-25 reaching speeds 6 to 7 kilometres per hour faster than the McLaren MCL39 and 3 to 4 kilometres per hour quicker than the Red Bull RB21 — was not enough to make up for the large amounts of time lost in the corners. This translated into an average gap of about two and a half tenths of a second per lap to Oscar Piastri in the McLaren and more than four tenths to Max Verstappen in the Red Bull, at least until the first round of pit stops. Ironically, the lower cornering speed did at least allow Ferrari to put less stress on its tyres, which helped them to progressively close the performance gap in the later stages of the stints, reaching a pace that was more comparable to that of their rivals.
By carrying less speed through the bends, the Ferrari SF-25 generated less mechanical stress on the tyres, and this actually worked to its advantage in the central phase of the race. It was at this point that Max Verstappen himself admitted that he began to feel a drop in performance after having pushed extremely hard for more than thirty laps. For Ferrari, this scenario was reminiscent of what had already been seen earlier in the season at Jeddah: there too, the efficiency of the car and the time lost in traffic had helped contain tyre consumption on a track with very low degradation and an exceptionally smooth asphalt surface.
Ferrari’s decision to gamble on a very low-drag setup was both understandable and defensible. It was, in effect, a true technical all-in, a single-minded strategy aimed at trying to maximise the one strength of the car. Even Red Bull ended up adopting a similar approach in order to make a difference, following the direction first set by Ferrari. Betting everything on one specific area of performance was really the only possible way to try to defeat a car as complete and well-balanced as the McLaren. But the crucial weakness remained the same: the limited aerodynamic load generated by the underbody and the bodywork of the SF-25.
Looking back across the entire 2025 season so far, the Red Bull RB21 has consistently demonstrated superiority in very high-speed corners, thanks to its stability and the high levels of downforce it is capable of producing. These are qualities that the Ferrari SF-25 has never managed to match, and both Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton have often reported their struggles with this limitation over the radio and in debriefs. This deficit had already emerged clearly at several earlier races, but at Monza it became even more obvious and damaging. It was not possible to solve it by adding more wing angle, because that would have compromised aerodynamic efficiency and sacrificed Ferrari’s biggest strength, its top speed.
It is true that every car has its own unique aerodynamic map, with characteristics that determine efficiency depending on the level of downforce and the type of corner. Paradoxically, McLaren tends to work better and show greater efficiency when running with more wing and higher levels of downforce, while Red Bull is the opposite, often excelling with very light wing levels. That is why at other fast circuits like Silverstone we have already seen Red Bull risk extreme low-drag configurations. Ferrari, however, has different characteristics and could not follow exactly the same philosophy.
There had been legitimate doubts that running with such little rear downforce might lead to increased sliding, and therefore to higher tyre degradation. But in reality, the surprisingly low tyre wear seen at Monza largely eliminated this risk, neutralising one of McLaren’s biggest strengths — their superb management of the rear tyres. This unintended consequence levelled out the field somewhat and reduced the impact of one of McLaren’s main weapons.
This scenario allowed both McLaren and Red Bull to push without fear during the early stages, and it highlighted the superiority of their aerodynamic downforce. Monza was meant to be the stage for Ferrari’s revival, a chance to shine in front of their home fans. Instead, it turned into a faithful reflection of the inherent limitations of the SF-25 project. And perhaps it is precisely this awareness, this confirmation of structural weakness, that leaves the deepest mark for Ferrari moving forward.
Sep 11, 2025
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