Leclerc rues Ferrari struggles despite Red Bull woe

Ewan Gale
Saturday 30 July 2022 20:45

Charles Leclerc was left to bemoan another poor day for Ferrari despite the woe experienced by F1 title rival Max Verstappen.

The Monégasque qualified third for the Hungarian Grand Prix after being beaten by Mercedes' George Russell and team-mate Carlos Sainz on Saturday.

But a further source of frustration for Leclerc was his inability to capitalise on a difficult day for Red Bull as Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez start 10th and 11th respectively, with the former hit by power unit issues.

Asked if he could be happy given his rivals' struggles, Leclerc replied: "Mostly we are focusing on ourselves, so today has not been a great day.

"I have been struggling massively with our tyres and had a lot of inconsistency to put our tyres in the right window with those conditions and I struggled to put a lap together.

"We will look into it. I am pretty sure we have got the pace in the car to come back to the front tomorrow so we will focus on that and hopefully we will have a better Sunday.

"The pace is there so we just need to understand what went on with the tyres."

Sainz explains renewed feeling behind Ferrari

Carlos Sainz has been in supreme form since taking his first pole and victory at the British Grand Prix.

The Spaniard was fastest in Paul Ricard a week ago and was only denied by a back-of-the-grid penalty.

"Definitely feeling better and better every race and qualifying session," said Sainz. "I felt like I had the pace for pole position but it went away from us in the last sector with a few snaps through the lap.

"But congratulations to George. He must have done a pretty good lap in the Merc and we will race from P2 tomorrow."