Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc hailed a big step forward as Sunday’s Formula 1 championship runner-up and hopes for a better record next season.
Monegasque finished second behind Red Bull double world champion Max Verstappen in the season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.
“In terms of where we were last year, it’s really a big step forward,” said the 25-year-old, who won three of the season’s 22 races while teammate Carlos Sainz won once. said.
Ferrari finished as runner-up in the championship against Red Bull, after finishing last year in third place and without a win. They also left empty in 2020, when they finished sixth overall.
Ferrari has had 12 pole positions this year, the most of any team and 10 more than last season, as well as 16 podium finishes.
Leclerc is seventh overall in 2021, with Sainz in fifth, and this season has been his best in Formula 1 even as Ferrari fans are disappointed that the team has failed again.
“I think we improved throughout the end of the season in terms of strategy,” said Leclerc, who won two of the first three races of the year before his title bid collapsed. , who won two of the first three races of the year before his title bid collapsed due to machine unreliability, driver error and strategic error.
“We still need to try on race pace, because on Sunday we seem to be struggling a bit more. But we’ll try during the winter break to catch up with them a little bit.”
Leclerc executed a successful one-stop strategy on Sunday while Perez pitted twice and was unable to contain his opponent despite an interesting chase late in the game.
“I am confident that in terms of speed we will catch up with Red Bull next year,” Leclerc said.
Team boss Mattia Binotto said the team was successful in returning to competition.
“We can leave 2022 knowing that we have made a lot of progress and as of Tuesday we will begin to prepare for the new challenge that awaits us in 2023,” he said.
