The British GP definitely didn’t go according to Ferrari’s plans, especially on one side of the garage. Charles Leclerc’s Silverstone troubles began on Saturday, when he failed to qualify in the top ten for the race.
However, the worst was yet to come, as the Monegasque driver was pitted for intermediates too early on his quest to secure a positive finish. Leclerc had moved up to P7, gaining three spots on the opening lap only ahead of the incoming rain miscommunication.
On Lap 16, Leclerc was informed by Bryan Bozzi that “we expect heavy rain now. It’s going to happen soon”. He’s then told “this heavy rain should last another two to three laps, then stop. Then another heavy [burst of] rain”.
More info came from Bozzi in terms of meteorological updates on Lap 18: “This should last another three or four laps” , and “Heavier rain in the pitlane, class two to three”.
Leclerc asks “how long will it last”, with Bozzi replying that it will last “another 10 minutes” at the current intensity.
Thus at the start of the next lap, Leclerc begins to get into the mindset of boxing following those radio messages from his enginner.
While on his last lap in P7, the Ferrari driver was still unsure, as he saw many dry spots around the track as he went through the Maggots and Becketts sequence.
“Wait a second before boxing because part of the track is pretty dry still.”
He proceeds to say “box, box” on the Hangar straight, with Bozzi saying “copy, box” and the “leaders still staying out” in reply.
Ultimately Leclerc makes the final call following all that information he was fed by his engineer via the strategy team, and it was not successful, as the right conditions for the inters came later in the race, around lap 26, when frontrunners Sainz and Verstappen pitted.
Zhou Guanyu, Esteban Ocon and Sergio Pérez followed Leclerc’s strategy, but ultimately no-one out of the four drivers on the risky call found his way into the top 10. All of them lost over a minute trundling around on the wrong tyre, getting lapped in the process.
The 2024 Monaco GP winner was the best runner among those, ending up in P14, but it still was a terrible day in the office for him.
Ferrari Team Principal Fred Vasseur talked about the thought process that had gone behind the decision, explaining that it had been motivated by the distance between Leclerc and his teammate Sainz ahead of him in P6, and a desire to go all in in order to try and achieve a podium.
Leclerc had been behind Stroll for the first 10 laps, hurting his mediums in the process.
“We are giving them information, and we are proposing the call, the fact that at one stage they have to pit, and they have to do the last call.
“On this situation, and I discussed with Charles, for sure it can be disappointing when you see the result at the end, but first it’s clear that it was not the right call, or the right decision.
“But I would say that it’s also motivated by the fact that at this stage we are already 15 seconds behind Carlos, or 10 seconds behind Carlos. It means that consciously or unconsciously, you know that the only way to come back and to fight for the podium, is to be a bit aggressive into the decision.”
Ultimately, the Frenchman conceded it wasn’t the right call, mentioning that it had seemed like a better option at the time as Hamilton and Russell went straight on at turn 1 in the tricky conditions.
Nonetheless, Vasseur did not feel too downbeat about the risky option.
“For sure it’s not the right call, because I think he would have finished P6. But collectively we took this decision, and I don’t want to say it’s a good one, because the reality is that it’s not a good one, but I’m not upset with this.
“Because if you have a look at the same lap, Hamilton went wide in Turn 1, Russell went wide in Turn 1, another car went wide in Turn 15. It was really on the edge to become the very good call.
“And when you are in the situation to be in the group of leaders, you will never take this risk. You will copy the others, and it’s what Carlos said and did.”
