
Leclerc makes 'unclean' Ferrari admission in failed Red Bull pursuit
Leclerc makes 'unclean' Ferrari admission in failed Red Bull pursuit

Charles Leclerc has conceded Ferrari overcooked its pursuit of Red Bull which led to it not being "clean enough to challenge" in the battle for this year's F1 title.
Ferrari and Leclerc initially took a commanding championship lead after scoring two wins from the opening three races of the season but it has since limped to the finish line, with the team now falling into the clutches of Mercedes for second place in the constructors' standings.
After the Japanese Grand Prix, where Max Verstappen was confirmed as the drivers' champion, Leclerc urged the Scuderia to use the final races to improve on areas of weakness and build a platform for success in 2023.
Asked ahead of this weekend's São Paulo GP how Ferrari could achieve this, Leclerc replied: “Learning from mistakes. This is the main thing.
"I also believe that whenever you are into the rhythm of good races then that helps.
"We had a moment of our season where we struggled a lot and that then pushed people to maybe overdo things and that is where mistakes occur.
“So on that, I feel we have learned the lesson and hopefully, we won’t do that next year.”
Red Bull "nearly faultless this season"
Red Bull has scored nine consecutive victories in a run that stretches back to the French Grand Prix just prior to the summer shutdown.
Across the season, Verstappen has also broken the record to become the most successful driver in a single year, claiming 14 victories to surpass the previous benchmark set by Sebastian Vettel and Michael Schumacher.
Assessing what Red Bull and Verstappen have achieved this season, Leclerc said: “Max and Red Bull have been nearly faultless this season.
"They’ve done an incredible job and completely deserve to win the title. We haven’t been clean enough to challenge them.
"The performance was probably there but there were too many mistakes - reliability, strategy, also my mistakes cost some points. And on that, we need to get better.
“But Max has done a good job.”
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F1 Standings

Drivers
- Charles Leclerc
- Carlos Sainz
- Lando Norris
- Oscar Piastri
- Pierre Gasly
- Esteban Ocon
- Sergio Pérez
- Max Verstappen
- Alexander Albon
- Logan Sargeant
- Lewis Hamilton
- George Russell
- Nico Hülkenberg
- Kevin Magnussen
- Fernando Alonso
- Lance Stroll
- Valtteri Bottas
- Zhou Guanyu
- Nyck De Vries
- Liam Lawson
- Daniel Ricciardo
- Yuki Tsunoda
Races
-
Gulf Air Grand Prix of Bahrain 2023
-
Saudi Arabian Grand Prix 2023
-
Grand Prix of Australia 2023
-
Grand Prix of China 2023
-
Grand Prix of Azerbaijan 2023
-
Miami Grand Prix 2023
-
Qatar Airways Gran Premio Del Made In Italy E Dell'emilia Romagna 2023
-
Grand Prix of Monaco 2023
-
AWS Gran Premio de España 2023
-
Grand Prix du Canada 2023
-
Grand Prix of Austria 2023
-
Aramco Grand Prix of Great Britain 2023
-
Grand Prix of Hungary 2023
-
Grand Prix of Belgium 2023
-
Heineken Dutch Grand Prix 2023
-
Grand Prix of Italy 2023
-
Grand Prix of Singapore 2023
-
Grand Prix of Japan 2023
-
Qatar Grand Prix 2023
-
Grand Prix of the United States 2023
-
Gran Premio de la Ciudad de Mexico 2023
-
Rolex Grande Prêmio de São Paulo 2023
-
Heineken Silver Las Vegas Grand Prix 2023
-
Grand Prix of Abu Dhabi 2023
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