Charles Leclerc finished qualifying for the Australian GP in seventh place. A disappointing result. Returning to the Ferrari box, the driver vented about the strategy and also took it out on Sainz.
Verstappen in pole a Melbourne, dove le Mercedes they have risen again, we will see if it will be true glory, but in the meantime Russell and Hamilton have taken the photo that the first three take after Qualifying. Alonso fourth, then Sainz. Leclerc only weeko and very disappointed. A year ago he started from pole on Sunday only from the fourth row. The Monegasque knew he couldn’t repeat himself, but he hoped to do better and after the Qualifying session he complained a lot. He took it out on Ferrari and also on Sainz.
Defining him bitter is an understatement. Leclerc was really angry after the last lap of Qualifying in Melbourne. Compared to the other top teams, Ferrari has always tried to get its drivers to warm up the tires more. But in the finale of Q3, which is always frenetic, there was the risk of rain. At that moment, the track engineers of Sainz and Leclerc opted for a different strategy for the drivers.
Sainz had one more lap available and for this he would have had to slipstream Leclerc, in such a tight qualifying even a tenth could make the difference. But Carlos escapes in the first two straights, then the two get closer but the main train has passed.
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Leclerc did not improve and remained seventh and returning to the pits he let off steam with his engineer xavi marcos, who had chosen this type of strategy because he feared the rain. The words spoken in the radio team are more than clear: “A shitty Q3, with no preparation laps and the rain didn’t come. Big thanks to Carlos for the trailI picked up some speed and it’s always nice“.
Angry yes for the tactical choice, but ironic with Sainz. Leclerc reiterated the concept, in a much more sweetened way when speaking with Sky: “We were afraid the rain would come, so we decided to push straight away. Unfortunately we missed too much to be in front, but we need to see with the team what happened with Carlos in the first sector in Q3. It was clear that I had to push on that lap, but Carlos was ahead of me in the first sector and was preparing his tyres: it’s a shame, but I don’t mean we would have necessarily done better. We need to improve this aspect.”
Leclerc also in Mara Sangiorgio of Sky then spoke about the race and was much more confident there: “PI think I have a more racing car, but it doesn’t justify our seventh place. We had more, and we had to do a better job. Am I surprised by the Mercedes? Honestly, I’ve never worried about them, I’ve always stayed focused on Ferrari.”
