Ferrari enters 2021 looking to rebound from its worst season in 40 years, when it finished sixth in the constructors' standings with only three podium finishes. 

Due to its underperforming power unit and draggy aerodynamic concept, the team struggled with a problematic SF1000 car that was plagued y a lack of straight-line performance. 

Ferrari also started the season late after announcing Sebastian Vettel will be leaving the team at the end of 2020 and replacing him with Carlos Sainz Jr.

According to Leclerc, a "strange" environment formed at Maranello as the truth of Ferrari's situation became apparent to the team in the early part of last year.

When asked by Autosport.com, about the atmosphere at Ferrari. Leclerc answers, "At first there was a strange atmosphere at first in 2020 where we realised the reality of things, that it was quite a lot worse than what we expected,"

Leclerc continues, "There was a time where it was not great. But very quickly the mentality changed and there was a huge motivation to try and come back to where we want to be.

In addition, "I think this didn't change for this year. With Carlos, he is bringing experience from other teams too, that he's very interesting and that he's also giving us new worlds to explore.

To conclude, he states, "So this is very interesting, but I guess the mentality of the team itself is still as motivated as last year and is really willing to push to have better things and better days coming soon."

Ferrari was inspired by its success in Bahrain last week with the new SF21 car, with team boss Mattia Binotto announcing that straight-line speed was no longer a drawback going into the 2021 season.

When asked about the team's pre-season performance improvements, Binotto said he was happy with how the data was lining up with Ferrari's factory standards.

Ferrari's Team Principal, Mattia Binotto states, "What was more important for us was to understand the correlation with the wind tunnel and the simulations, so gathering data and comparing.

He continues, "I think we're pretty happy with the correlation, which means we've got a good baseline at least for the next simulations or eventual developments.

To conclude, "Correlation was a key factor in those [test] days. So far at least, it's going pretty well."