“It was definitely an important win – especially for me,” says Charles Leclerc about his success in Spielberg two weeks ago. The Ferrari driver failed to finish on the podium five times in a row, falling from first to third place in the world championship. But with his victory in Austria he gave the go-ahead for a race to catch up.
“We had five races where it felt like everything was going against me, so it was important to get that win and points on Max [Verstappen] to catch up,” said Leclerc, who is still 38 points behind the Red Bull driver. “38 is quite a lot, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible.”
A good result in France this weekend would help, but Le Castellet was by far Ferrari’s worst race of the season last year. Leclerc and his teammate Carlos Sainz broke the tires completely, so they ended up out of the points on their own – Leclerc even only in 16th place.
Tire management extremely important for Ferrari
“Tyre management was one of those things that we had big problems with,” he says. “Therefore we will put our full focus in training to be prepared for the race.”
At Spielberg, however, Ferrari seemed to have the upper hand over Red Bull when it came to tyres. Although the Bulls appeared to be stronger during tire warm-up and thus at the beginning of a stint, Ferrari was able to make up for this later. “I’m not unhappy that we couldn’t keep up at the beginning because that paid off later – and that counts,” said Leclerc.
“It’s true that they tend to be very quick in the first few laps of the stint. We know that might be a weakness for us,” he continues. “But in the end you have to look at the big picture and tire management has been good for us in the past few races.”
But Leclerc also knows: “That doesn’t mean it has to be like that this weekend.”
“The goal is still to win the World Cup”
But there is also the other side: Ferrari had already revealed some tactical weaknesses and reliability problems this season that put Leclerc behind in the World Cup. Nevertheless, he emphasizes that he has full confidence in his team and does not believe that Ferrari is operationally worse than Red Bull.
“Of course we made a few mistakes like in Silverstone or Monaco, but that happens to every team,” he dismisses. “We’re just more in the spotlight now because we’re fighting for victories.” Of course you still have to improve, he interjects, “but I don’t think there’s a particular weakness there.”
The Ferrari driver travels to France and to the other races of the season with a clear goal: “The goal is still to win the world championship,” he clarifies. “I don’t plan on losing any more points than we already have.”
He stresses that his belief in it is still as strong as it was five races ago. “Of course we made a few mistakes and we had reliability issues. But now we just have to be perfect until the end of the season. And then I’m sure we can close the gap.”