In the heat of the moment, Charles Leclerc suggested that Ferrari’s decision to put him on the wrong tire to qualify for the Brazilian Grand Prix was “unbelievable”, but later revealed he had accepted the selection. tires before hitting the road. follow up in Q3.
Medium tire usage when the rest of the top ten were cut proved costly for Leclerc and left him tenth on the grid for Saturday’s sprint.
The track was only dry enough for slick tires at the start of Q3 and by the time Ferrari realized its mistake and ordered Leclerc to return to the pit, he had already started a lap on the intermediate tyres, which he ended up with. we have quit.
Leclerc was clearly frustrated having held back in his post-race interviews, but voiced his feelings over team radio as he returned to the pit after George Russell inflicted a leaf red flags by turning over the gravel.
“Did everyone complete a round on the spill?” Leclerc asked his engineer over the team radio.
“Yes, they did,” came the reply.
“Unbelievable,” Leclerc added. “Unbelievable.”
When asked what happened after training, Leclerc said: “We were expecting a rain that never came. I’ll talk to the team and try to understand what we could have done better in those days. that condition. Disappointingly, the speed was there.”
Ferrari sporting director Laurent Mekies said the team was betting on rain with Leclerc, but chose to split the strategy to have teammate Carlos Sainz go out on slick tyres.
“It’s the kind of qualifying call where you have to make a lot of calls, some of the calls we made today worked well, some of them underperformed,” he said. “It’s a bit frustrating because we got both cars into Q3 and then we were faced with a lot of choices: on the one hand the track wasn’t dry yet – and there’s a golden rule that says you should wear tires to match the track if it’s dry – but otherwise we forecast heavy rain immediately.
“At the end of the day we split our car in half because you always know at that time that depending on the exact time of the rain, there will be a happy man and an unhappy man. And that’s exactly what happened because the rain came a minute too late for Charles.”
Leclerc was second in the pit exit queue in Q3 and just behind Kevin Magnussen’s Haas, who took the shock post by timing the tire slippery before it rained.
To be at the front of the queue, Ferrari had to make the decision relatively early to give Leclerc enough time to drive down the pit lane, which means the team doesn’t yet know which tire its opponent has chosen first. when you let him go.
With rain forecast, Ferrari chose the middle and finished second in the queue, but ultimately lost.
Leclerc said: “I accepted the decision to join the training and then I just waited for the rain that never came.
