Charles Leclerc claims ‘Red Bull and McLaren are doing something special’ after losing out on the win in Imola

Charles Leclerc managed a third place finish at the Imola event!

Charles Leclerc claims ‘Red Bull and McLaren are doing something special’ after losing out on the win in Imola

Max Verstappen, Lando Norris, and Charles Leclerc (Via: Imago)

Charles Leclerc of Scuderia Ferrari put in a relentless performance for the Tifosi and finished P3 at Imola on Sunday. His teammate, Carlos Sainz, finished P5 after what seemed to be a dim performance from Ferrari, compared to their form in qualifying and practice.

After their strong performance on the initial two days of running, Ferrari had set their sights on the win in Imola. But come Sunday, they felt powerless against the likes of Red Bull and McLaren, who massively outshined them in the race.

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McLaren and Red Bull are doing something special with the launch with their engine and they are gaining all of that (sector 1 time) just there, and max obviously had a slipstream other than that.
Charles Leclerc said in post race interviews

Ferrari looked much superior in practice than their rivals but couldn’t quite perform up to their expectations during the main race. Charles Leclerc after the event, speculated that McLaren and Red Bull had something ‘special’ about their engines, which made them gain a lot over the others, particularly around the first sector of the Imola circuit.

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Carlos Sainz felt there were problems with his SF-24 during the Imola race

As mentioned above, Carlos Sainz had a frustrating afternoon at Imola, as the Spaniard finished P5 and could not do much in terms of challenging the likes of Red Bull and McLaren. He ended his exploits behind the Woking-based team’s Oscar Piastri.

Carlos Sainz
Carlos Sainz (Via: Imago)
It was a difficult race for me.It's not something related to setup, it's related to other things, which, obviously, we don't talk about in F1. But we saw a couple of things, on the aero side and on the engine side, especially at the start of the race, that we need to resolve.
Carlos Sainz said in his post race interview

Sainz has outperformed himself this season as he managed to secure a win at the Australian Grand Prix. He secured the victory even after having surgery for appendicitis just weeks ago.

Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz race in Monaco in a week, which is the hometown of the former driver. The duo will look to improve their performance in order to be able to challenge the likes of McLaren and Red Bull, who have been dominant this season, the title race is heating up nicely between the three teams.

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