Ferrari will surely hope to keep their momentum going at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix after their unexpected yet brilliant race win on their home turf. With the battle for the constructors’ title heating up fast, it’s imperative for them to further optimise the upgrade package they had introduced at Monza to gain ground on Red Bull and McLaren.
Having secured the last three pole positions (four, if you count the sprint qualifying last year) at Baku, Charles Leclerc is certainly a driver you cannot rule out heading into the race weekend. While the SF-24 is famously struggling in qualifying in comparison to its recent predecessors, Ferrari will count on the Monégasque’s one-lap prowess and the car’s superior race pace to deliver a good result on Sunday. However, they appear to be cautiously optimistic, given their sharp dip in performance after their previous race win in Monaco.
In his media session, Leclerc was asked whether his track record at Baku and his recent win at the Italian Grand Prix would provide him additional confidence to navigate this weekend well. The 26-year-old revealed that he approaches every race weekend in a similar manner in terms of preparation. At the same time, he added that the team prefers to reset after every race, regardless of the result. Taking into account their on-track struggles after their victory in Monaco, Leclerc emphasised that it’s essential to temper their expectations despite his excellent showings on the narrow streets of Baku in the past.
“Not, not more than other tracks. I think that’s really what we are trying to do as a team. Now we’ve got to reset whenever we come to a track and not think about the previous race. We’ve seen it in Montreal after Monaco, which Monaco went really well. And then we struggled a lot in Montreal. So we’ve got to come here with a new mindset.
“I mean, not a new mindset because the mindset remains the same, but with no expectations. And that’s what we try to do. Then of course, I cannot forget that it’s one of my favorite tracks and I love this track and I feel particularly at ease on this one. So normally I’ve been pretty strong in the past. However, it doesn’t influence the way I prepare myself for this race. I just prepare myself as well as any other race weekends.”
On the topic of where Ferrari stands in terms of relative performance and whether they can see themselves inching towards Red Bull and McLaren and challenging them for the constructors’ championship as the season draws to a close, Leclerc admitted that they are not on par with those teams yet. However, referring to Monza, he stated that the Scuderia intends to capitalise on the weekends when Red Bull or McLaren fail to extract the full potential of their packages. The seven-time race winner also added that Ferrari needs to work on their inconsistency in order to overcome the teams ahead of them, especially McLaren, who boasts the fastest car at the moment.
“I don’t think we are at the level of McLaren and Red Bull yet. I think like in Monza, when they don’t optimise their package, we can be here and try and win it. And we did it in Monza.
“However, going forward, we still have some steps forward to be done in order to challenge them consistently. They still have the faster car, especially McLaren, I think. Then it’s probably Red Bull. And then Mercedes. It depends with us; we are a bit more inconsistent. But yeah, we still have some work to do.”
With regard to the questions of why he has a strong affinity with this circuit and what makes him consistently fast here, Leclerc reiterated his love for city tracks and the challenge they pose in terms of risk management. He elaborated on the psychological aspect of the challenge and how he has successfully tackled it in the past to get the most out of the car, despite losing points on occasions. The latest race winner disclosed that his confidence to push flat out even when the stakes are higher than usual gives him an advantage on street circuits. Additionally, he admitted that he simply enjoys the rhythm of the Baku City Circuit.
“Apart from the fact that it’s a city track, and I particularly like city tracks, I think there’s just an element of risk management that there’s less so in normal racetracks, where there you have a bit more room to do a mistake. You can lock up a wheel and it has no consequence. Here on the city track, it has consequences. So the risk is a lot more in the head of the driver.
“And this is something, this is a challenge that I particularly like and in which I’ve been particularly fast in the past. So that also cost me some points sometimes. But at the same time, that’s I think also where my strength is on those tracks. So it’s not something I will change. But I will say that then for this particular track, I don’t really know. I just like the rhythm of it. But that’s it.”
