Charles Leclerc left baffled by 'UNDRIVABLE' Ferrari after dismal qualifying

Charles Leclerc

Leclerc left baffled by 'UNDRIVABLE' Ferrari after dismal qualifying

Charles Leclerc was eliminated in Q1 ahead of the Spanish Grand Prix following a difficult qualifying session

Harry Smith

Saturday 3 June 2023 22:42

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Charles Leclerc was left baffled and bemused on Saturday afternoon after he was eliminated in Q1 during qualifying for the Spanish Grand Prix.

The Monegasque driver was audibly concerned with the performance of his Ferrari when speaking after the session, complaining that he knew something was wrong compared to the practice sessions.

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Leclerc will now start the Spanish Grand Prix from P19, while Ferrari team-mate Carlos Sainz will line up on the front row of the grid alongside pole-sitter Max Verstappen.

This will be immensely disappointing for Leclerc, who went into the weekend hoping that the major upgrade package added to the SF-23 would improve performance relative to Ferrari's front-running rivals.

Leclerc: I have no answers

“I don’t have the answer for now," Leclerc said when speaking about the performance of his SF-23 to Sky Sports F1.

"The only thing that I can say is that the left-hand corners were undrivable. The right-hand corners the feeling was very similar to this morning.

"But there’s just something off in the left-hand corners that we need to analyse and understand because it was very far off what I expected."

Leclerc endured a turbulent qualifying session ahead of Sunday's grand prix

The Monegasque driver also explained how he narrowly avoided an incident at the start of the session.

“I can’t even remember. I had so many moments and even during the first red flag I nearly lost it and put it in the gravel in a left-hand corner. This was just very very weird behaviour. So, we’ll have to check the car.

"Even this morning, in those conditions, in the tricky conditions of this morning I was feeling really good with the car. There’s something wrong."