Not a great start for the weekend for Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc after a premature Q2 exit with a 1:27.097 after making a correction in Turns 13 and 15 which lost him a couple of tenths.
The Monegasque stated that they are just struggling at the moment and the practice sessions were mainly for gathering data for the team without focusing on optimising the weekend, and they paid the price for it. He is in high spirits though as long-term it could help with understanding the car and its quirks and operating windows.
“We are just struggling a lot at the moment. I feel like yesterday we learned a good amount for the team by splitting the cars. That comes also with the fact that you are not really optimising your weekend and focusing on performance only.
“Obviously today we lose a Q3 by a tenth and it was the first time I was driving with this configuration on the dry after FP3 in the wet. So all in all we are struggling to optimise the weekend but I think that it will help us long term what we have done yesterday. However I feel like we are paying a little bit the price today of it.“
Ferrari made the decision to come back to the old Imola spec, when asked why, he said: “It was a little bit better and that is the main reason why we came back to the old package.“
The 26-year-old stated that since Monaco, they have lost performance and said that the package regression was mainly because of the car bouncing all over the place, and the data gathered from Silverstone has been helpful in understanding what went awry in the car.
“I won’t go too much into detail but for sure we have lost some performance since Monaco as a matter of fact and we are looking into it. That is also why we are doing all these tests.
“We came to the conclusion that it was the right choice to come back for this weekend mostly because of bouncing and we will take the right decision for the future very soon and what we have done yesterday was very helpful to help us take the right decision going forward.”
After being asked if seeing Mercedes bounce back from being in a similar position a couple of races ago, the 6-time race winner was quick to come back to the present and say that they are the ones who are struggling for two races straight.
“Well no, Mercedes is in front, McLaren is in front, Red Bull is in front and we are the ones that have been struggling since two races. So like I said now since too many races we need to bounce back and try and find the balance and just the performance that is in the car that we don’t quite find for now.”
Asked about the lap in Q2, the Ferrari driver said that the main losses were from turns 13 and 15 where he had almost no grip, and can’t get the car to properly rotate.
“Turn 13, turn 15 I went completely straight. The front left was just out the window. I just had very little grip so struggling a lot with the balance in the high speed and just getting that car rotated, so yes that is where I think most of the lap time was.”
Leclerc is hopeful for a miracle to happen, welcoming the rain as a possible opportunity because he says that the same strategy for everyone in the dry will be the worst thing for them to happen in the race.
“Anything can help us. The worst thing would be a normal race with the same strategy for everybody so I am welcoming the rain if there is some.”
