Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur says the fan response to the modified schedule at the Sao Paulo Grand Prix shows that Formula 1 and the FIA ​​made the right decisions.

Heavy rain and storms caused qualifying to be postponed from Saturday to Sunday morning and, with another worrying forecast for Sunday afternoon, the race was brought forward by 90 minutes. That led to a 7:30am qualifying session that saw Lando Norris take pole before Max Verstappen’s shock victory, and Vasseur says the queues of fans waiting to get in reminded him it was the right decision for the assistants.

“We can’t complain,” Vasseur said. “At the end of the day, we were able to make the race. I think the race was good. What we have to keep in mind is that when I arrived at 5 in the morning there were already thousands of fans outside and at least for them it is important to do the work.

“Of course the conditions were not ideal for the team, for everyone, but at the end of the day it was the only option to do the race and I think it was a good one.”

Charles Leclerc’s fifth place helped limit the damage in the constructors’ championship between Ferrari and McLaren, but the Monegasque blamed himself for set-up choices that hurt his pace, something Vasseur disagrees with.

“He’s always the first to blame himself, but I’m not sure he’s in charge of the setup. It was a difficult Sunday, but I think overall it’s not a dramatic weekend. And it’s more about some decisions that were quite difficult to anticipate, things like the pit stop. You can say at the end of the day that if you stay on the road and wait for the red flag, it’s the right decision, but if you crash you look stupid.

“Honestly, these types of weekends are quite difficult to manage from the pit wall and the car; but it’s more the rhythm and the set-up because the rhythm was really difficult. We were seven tenths slower than Norris at the beginning of the stint and probably six or seven tenths faster than him at the end.