Charles Leclerc: “The last part was nice but…”

Despite starting from the back row, Charles Leclerc finished fifth at the Canadian Grand Prix.

Rising to the challenge time each time, it felt as though he couldn’t quite catch a break in Montreal.

Race Reaction

The Monagasque mentioned, “It was a super-frustrating race. The last part was nice but obviously the very first part I was stuck in a DRS train and I couldn’t do anything. Then in the middle part of the race, I found myself stuck behind Esteban, who had much newer tyres, so out of Turn 10, when the tyres are actually making the difference, he had very good traction and that was enough for him to keep me behind all the time.”

With new Ferrari power unit elements, he received a penalty resulting in a back row start. Leclerc tried to get that straight-line speed but his Ferrari F1-75 wasn’t quite there. Then a super slow pit stop saw him fall behind into mid table. Yet perseverance and pace propelled him to make up 14 places and score points. His main competition in the race was Red Bull and Mercedes.

Competition Reaction

Charles claimed, “I don’t know, I have no idea because I haven’t seen Red Bull at all during the race, they were just too far in front. But the feeling was good and whenever the feeling is good, that’s a good sign. Whether it was enough or not to beat Red Bull, I don’t know. I think it’s been close during the whole season and it would have been close today. I don’t know but I felt like Carlos was strong today so this shows that it would have been close, as it has been with Carlos.”

Ferrari has to find a way to continue their consistent top position. Then they may see victory soon again.

Last he added, “I’m looking forward to Silverstone now. It’s one of my favourite circuits on the calendar and hopefully we can score some big points there.”

Leclerc is in third with 126 points in the driver standings. Ferrari are sitting second with 228 points in the constructor standings.

Team Reaction

Team Principal, Mattia Binotto said, “We came into this weekend knowing it would be a case of damage limitation, given we would have one car at the back of the grid and we came away from it having closed the gap slightly in the Constructors’ classification, after a race that demonstrated that reliability problems can affect everyone in the current Formula 1. We have some of these issues and, back in Maranello, we are working flat out to fix them definitively. Charles did his very best, making up 14 places from the back row to finish fifth. Carlos drove a great race, which demonstrated just how much confidence he now has in the car. Now we head to Silverstone, where we expect our rivals to introduce some updates, but we certainly intend to be competitive there.”

Headline Image Credit: F1.