The first day of action on the track for Charles Leclerc was undoubtedly strange, both positive and negative. The weekend immediately started in the wrong way, due to a spin in FP1 after a few minutes which effectively forced him to miss the entire first session.
Although on sprint weekends we tend not to take too many risks on the setup side given that there is little time available before the start of qualifying and the related Parc Fermé, relying on the set-ups planned in the factory, arriving in qualifying without preparation is not the ‘ideal. Yet Charles Leclerc put together a beautiful flying lap performance, taking the front row ahead of Saturday’s sprint race.
A second position which, logically, left the Monegasque extremely satisfied given the context of the first day, but not just for a question of mere result. In fact, the Cavallino standard-bearer believes that today’s good performance can put to rest certain rumors about his state of form.
The episode in FP1 that forced him to miss the first free practice session
“Yes, I’m happy. They are because qualifying was the weak point for two races in a row. At one point, it was a little better in China, but we didn’t have the car to prove it. And in a weekend as difficult as this, where obviously I only did one lap in FP1, I had to immediately go into qualifying without references”, explained Leclerc at the end of the Sprint Qualifying, which ended with a second place, around a tenth behind poleman Verstappen .
The Ferrari driver relegated his teammate Carlos Sainz by around three tenths, but it should be underlined that the split times between the two Ferrari drivers were actually very similar: the Spaniard paid for the mistake at the last braking point when, due of a blockage, he arrived long wasting a lot of time. In this case, therefore, two elements made the difference for Leclerc: speed and the ability not to make any mistakes at the decisive moment.
“In SQ1 we could only use one set of tyres, so it was very difficult. But I immediately felt the feeling and the hard work I did at the start of the season to try to put the tires in the right window paid off”, continued the Monegasque, underlining the progress made from his point of view in the turning on the tires in qualifying. As the Ferrari driver himself has admitted several times, in fact, in the first rounds of this season the feeling with the soft tire on the flying lap was not always optimal, paying the price in terms of position on the grid.
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari SF-24
Photo by: Steven Tee / Motorsport Images
However, Leclerc believes that the progress is evident and, above all, he believes it can be a starting point to continue building on in the future.
“I’m happy, because now there’s a lot of talk, you’re only as good as your last race in this sport, and obviously when you have two races in a row where you did poorly in qualifying, and I didn’t do a great job, people start to speak. So it’s good to put an end to these rumors. But now I obviously have to work on consistency and try to stay at this level in terms of placing the tires in the right window, as I have done in the past.”
Given the lack of data in FP1, it is clearly difficult to say how the rest of the weekend will go. The Monegasque’s hope is to have a car capable of fighting for the top positions even in the race, perhaps dreaming of victory, although the pace currently remains an unknown: “I have no idea of our race pace. I only did one lap, so I have no idea about our race pace, but I really hope we can do a good sprint and have a good race pace to hopefully win on Sunday.”
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