“Ferrari had the better strategy,” Mathias Lauda believes Charles Leclerc was superior in Baku


“Ferrari had the better strategy,” Mathias Lauda believes Charles Leclerc was superior in Baku

Jacques Villeneuve feels that Charles Leclerc could do even better this season, and is unsure if he is on the same level as Max Verstappen.

Charles Leclerc is currently in third place, 34 points behind championship leader Max Verstappen. Before the feature race in Imola, he’d had a gap of more than 40 points at the top. His lead completely evaporated in Spain, where he retired from the lead. Then a strategic error from Ferrari in Monaco cost him what might have been an easy victory, at home no less. In Azerbaijan, both Ferraris retired.

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All of this just means that Leclerc may completely lose touch with the championship leader in a few races, provided that he does not start winning again soon. The pace has looked strong, and the driving has been almost impeccable, but it is fair to say that Leclerc has been let down by the car (and the team) on more than one occasion.

The retirements mean that Leclerc will soon have to take grid penalties. Whether he does that this weekend in Canada, or in one of the following, it remains to be seen. But what is known, is that grid penalties usually do not help your cause in a championship fight. His teammate, Carlos Sainz has also had fairly rotten luck and has also been unable to help Leclerc during the races.

Also Read: Charles Leclerc on being envious of Max Verstappen: ” I focus on becoming best version of myself”

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Mathias Lauda feels that Max Verstappen is going to find it ‘difficult’ over one lap

Sergio Perez and Max Verstappen
Max Verstappen’s teammate, Sergio Perez, has been stepping it up in qualifying recently.

Charles Leclerc has taken pole positions in all of the last 4 races. He has started on the front row in all of the races this season. But he has 0 victories in the last 4, and only 2 for the season, while Red Bull’s Max Verstappen has 5. This must be especially painful, as on weekends, where he could have taken victory, were devastated by things out of his own control.

While on the TV show, ‘Sport & Talk from Hangar 7‘ former DTM driver, Mathias Lauda said that while Ferrari has much more engine performance compared to, say, Mercedes, they may have breached the threshold of unreliability in doing so.

“Ferrari was able to get a lot out of the engine over the winter. Mercedes is extremely stable, but Ferrari is not. But it may be that someone who finds so much performance also reaches the limits.”

He felt that Charles Leclerc had a chance for victory in Azerbaijan and that Ferrari had even been better tactically than Red Bull, but as it was, Leclerc retired from the race due to what was presumably a power unit issue.

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“This time Ferrari was better in tactics than Red Bull. Leclerc could have won the race. We don’t know if it would have been enough.” he added: Leclerc has to mask everything; he has a good working package and can win races with it. Hopefully, the team can help him and do its homework.”

Sergio Perez has also increasingly become a factor in the championship following the last few races. Moreover, the Mexican has out-qualified Max Verstappen 3 times this season. The first time was in Jeddah, where he took pole position, and the others came in Monaco and Azerbaijan. He felt that was due in part due to the car not being particularly suited to Verstappen’s driving style.

It makes the situation at Red Bull easier now that Max is way aheadbut Perez had a good run towards Baku. He is very fast over one lap. I think Max doesn’t like the understeer in his car. In the race, he can straighten that out, but over one lap it’s going to be difficult.”

It is obvious that if Charles Leclerc wants to get back into the championship fight, then Canada is an ideal point to start a comeback. The team also cannot afford to make any more mistakes and have to be on top of their game.

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Also Read: Charles Leclerc dismisses Ferrari reliability woes: “I have faith in the team”

Also Read: “We need to keep pushing as a team,” Max Verstappen urges team to stay focused ahead of Canadian GP