Leclerc's Styrian GP charge "one of my best performances" in F1
Charles Leclerc said his charge from near the back of field to finish seventh in the Styrian Grand Prix was one of his best showings in Formula 1.
The Ferrari driver had to pit early at the Red Bull Ring after damaging his front wing in a brush with AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly on the run out of the first corner.
He dropped all the way down to 17th on the road, before pulling off a series of overtaking moves to battle his way up to seventh, one place behind teammate Carlos Sainz Jr.
Buoyed by the race pace of his car, just one week from the nightmare his team suffered in France, Leclerc felt the afternoon at the Red Bull had shown something special.
“If we look at the first lap, it's been an incredible race for us,” he told Sky F1. “We've been incredibly quick, but obviously this first lap basically stopped us from doing something much, much, much better today.
“It was a big opportunity. The pace was incredible. It's probably one of my best performances in Formula 1 today, apart from the lap one.”
Leclerc said the pace over the race in Austria was hugely encouraging because of the way that Ferrari has struggled on Sundays so far this year. It also bodes well for a repeat performance next week at the same track.
“I'm really looking forward to next weekend obviously,” he added. “Today it was really, really special. I mean, it's been a long time that we had this type of race pace. It was good to see.”
Daniel Ricciardo, McLaren MCL35M, Charles Leclerc, Ferrari SF21
Photo by: Charles Coates / Motorsport Images
Leclerc added he was unsure who was to blame for the clash with Gasly, as the slight brush between them caused a puncture that eventually put his AlphaTauri rival out of the race.
“To be honest, I need to re-watch the images from outside,” explained Leclerc. “I have no idea whether Pierre went a little bit to the left and I went a little bit to the right at the same time. I guess it's a bit of both. And at the end, we touched.”
Leclerc’s teammate Sainz was equally happy with his climb from 12th to sixth, but reckoned he could have finished higher up if he had not lost time being stuck behind a slow Lewis Hamilton who had lapped him earlier.
“It was a very good day in the office,” he said. “We managed to have a very strong first stint on the mediums, overcut pretty much the whole midfield with really good pace.
"Then a very weird scenario, no? I was on very fresh hards, I had Lando in front that I knew I could catch with clean air, but suddenly I found myself behind Lewis.
“I doubted for five, 10 laps, whether to follow him and to try to catch Lando. Suddenly I realised that Lewis was struggling with the tyres, I was much quicker and I had to unlap myself.
“But by the time I unlapped myself, it was too late to go and catch Lando.”
How Chapman obsessions lifted and limited Lotus post-Clark
Gifted, driven, obsessive – Colin Chapman’s ambition drove Lotus to soaring heights, but also into baffling technological cul-de-sacs as his business empire grew and his focus slipped. In the third part of our history of Lotus, DAMIEN SMITH considers the peaks and troughs of the 1970s
How reliance on car control can hinder F1 drivers
Balancing a car on the ragged edge for lap after lap entertains the fans, says BEN EDWARDS, but in the record books the drivers who work more subtly tend to be higher achievers
The continuing trends that should sustain F1's title fight at the Styrian GP
A year on from Formula 1's Austria double-header, the championship returns to the Red Bull Ring for the Styrian Grand Prix. Last year's race set the tone for Mercedes' continued dominance, but this year's offering so far leans into the current trends of a battle royale between F1's frontguard teams
How F1's biggest crisis helped trigger its exciting 2021 season
Formula 1's return to Austria this weekend comes under exceedingly different circumstances to its last Spielberg visit, when F1 took its first tentative steps out of the global COVID shutdown. But the tightrope F1 walked in 2020 has ultimately led to the most exciting season of the hybrid era
Can Red Bull really win anywhere now it’s toppled a Mercedes F1 stronghold?
OPINION: Red Bull team boss Christian Horner reckoned Max Verstappen winning the French Grand Prix – an event where Mercedes had previously been dominant – would signal “we can beat them anywhere”. Here’s how that claim stacks up looking at the rest of the 2021 season
The IndyCar feature that Paul Ricard desperately needs in F1
OPINION: The French Grand Prix offered a surprisingly interesting spectacle, despite the headache-inducing nature of the circuit. But IndyCar's Road America race offered far more in terms of action - and the increased jeopardy at the Elkhart Lake venue might be something Paul Ricard needs in future...
French Grand Prix Driver Ratings
The French GP was a weekend decided by tiny margins both at the front of the field, as Red Bull inflicted a comeback defeat on Mercedes, and in the battle for the minor points places. That's reflected in our driver ratings, where several drivers came close to a maximum score
How Red Bull took French GP "payback" on a day of Mercedes mistakes
The French GP has been a stronghold for Mercedes since Paul Ricard's return to the calendar in 2018. But that all changed on Sunday, as a clever two-stop strategy guided Red Bull's Max Verstappen to make a race-winning pass on the penultimate lap - for once leaving Mercedes to experience the pain of late defeat it has so often inflicted on Red Bull
