Charles Leclerc will start P4 for the Mexico City Grand Prix as he struggled in qualifying on Saturday afternoon in Mexico, finishing 0.319s off polesitter and stablemate Carlos Sainz.
After sitting out first practice to give Ollie Bearman a run as part of the mandatory rookie running, the 27-year-old had to do the Pirelli tyre test in FP2 along with the other 19 drivers.
Heading into FP3 and qualifying, he was on the back foot compared to Sainz. The Spaniard was absolutely on it from the first lap since Friday.
The 8-time race winner had a snap through the esses section in Q3, costing him a potential front row start. The pace was not there to challenge his stablemate for P1, however.
Leclerc was not surprised with the outcome.
“Yeah, disappointed, but not surprised. I was struggling and not feeling well since FP2 with the car. And yeah, that’s the way it is.
“In Q3 the lap was coming very, very nicely until Turn 10 where I lost the car, but I had to take those risks just because I didn’t have the pace. So yeah, it’s the way it is.
“I think P4 is not that bad, but of course disappointed.”
Leclerc admitted that the low grip surface in Mexico does not suit his style. A very attacking driver who likes to hustle the car in qualifying, it means the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez is one of his weakest on the calendar on a Saturday, along with Monza according to the 27-year-old, even if he has taken pole there twice.
On a positive note for the 3-time race winner in 2024, he is very happy with the race pace shown on Friday.
“Just grip and the feeling [is what I am lacking]. Sometimes you like the balance, today I didn’t. Yesterday I didn’t either.
“I think it’s probably not one of my strengths, the qualifying in very low grip tracks.
“I tend to push quite a lot in qualifying, and in Monza and here I always struggle quite a lot with that. However, it’s the way it is.
“The only thing that gives me some optimism is that I think I was the fastest guy yesterday in race simulations, which is a good thing.
“But starting from 4th I’m making my life more difficult.”
When the grip is lower as is the case this weekend, it forces Leclerc to think more about the lap and not go at 100% like he normally does.
He was relatively pleased with his final run until it all went wrong in the middle sector when he had a big slide that cost him valuable time. 0.005s covered Leclerc and Norris at the end of Q3.
“Yes. I’ve got to think a lot more in order to finish a lap and try to contain a bit more my will to push extremely hard in those qualifying because it just doesn’t work out on those tracks.
“Today I tried to do that. It was working pretty fine in Q3. However, I lost the car in Turn 10 and from that moment onwards it was very difficult to finish a lap.
“Yes [the tyres overheat if I push too hard], and you slide a lot just because there’s very low grip.
“You’ve just got to be a little bit less on the limit on those tracks, and I struggle a bit more to do that.
“However, for the race pace, it doesn’t seem to be an issue. It was an issue in Monza, I don’t think it will be an issue tomorrow, so on that I’m a lot less worried.
“But in quali it’s a bit tricky.”
Although he would have liked to have run in FP1, the driver running P3 in the World Championship admits it has not played the biggest role in his difficulties over a single lap.
“It always helps, especially on a difficult weekend for me. However, it’s like this.
“At the end, it hasn’t hurt my performance so much.
“It’s been a difficult weekend, so of course when it’s like this you want FP1, but we couldn’t have known before.”
Leclerc also praised Carlos Sainz for the performance he has delivered this weekend, with the Spaniard producing one of his best showings in his time at Ferrari to date.
“Congrats [to Sainz]. He did a better job than I did, so congratulations to him.
“Hopefully tomorrow we can do just like yesterday [on race pace].”
In Austin last Sunday, Leclerc and Sainz were incredibly fast and controlled the race to take a superb 1-2 for the Scuderia.
Ferrari has tended to be stronger on Sundays compared to Saturdays this year, and they will be hoping it’s the same tomorrow afternoon.
Nonetheless, Leclerc is wary of the fact that it will be more difficult for him as he starts behind Verstappen and Norris once again, and he noted McLaren looked a lot stronger on Saturday compared to Friday.
Unlike at COTA, overtaking is far trickier due to the fact they are well above altitude this weekend, pushing the cars to the limit on the reliability side.
“I don’t know, because McLaren has gained a lot of pace compared to yesterday.
“Max obviously didn’t run a lot yesterday, so it’s difficult to compare with Max. Actually, we don’t know about Max’s race pace.
“We are quite confident that our car could have a good pace tomorrow.
“However, I think it’s a different scenario compared to Austin, where it’s very easy to overtake.
“Here in Mexico, there’s a lot of overheating for the engines, for everything, and whenever you are P4, you’ve got to manage all these things, and it makes it a lot more difficult to come back.
“We’ll try our best, and if we do a good start like last week, then everything is possible.”
