F1 | Emilia Romagna GP | "It Was An Interesting Race, Although A Bit Frustrating" Says Leclerc
Scuderia Ferrari's Charles Leclerc reflects on his performance after today's interesting race.
Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow scored 22 points in the Gran Premio del Made in Italy e dell'Emilia-Romagna, thanks to a fourth-place finish for Charles Leclerc and a fifth-place finish for Carlos Sainz. Although the race demonstrated that the team is progressing, there is a sense of disappointment, as a podium finish was undeniably within Charles' reach today.
The race's turning point came on lap 32, when Valtteri Bottas and George Russell collided at the first corner, forcing the race to be stopped. Charles was second at the time, 25 seconds ahead of Lando Norris in the McLaren. The Monegasque had taken the lead by driving rapidly and precisely on a track that was steadily drying out, aided by set-up decisions made with the engineers in qualifying to drive with more aerodynamic downforce. The restart erased Charles' lead, and he was then passed by Norris and, with a few laps to go, by Hamilton.
Post-race, Leclerc comments, "It was an interesting race, although a bit frustrating, because I was in a really good place before the red flag which wiped out the advantage we had built up in the first part of the race."
To add, "Unfortunately, I struggled after the restart, since I was vulnerable in the straights and that made it difficult to fight or defend from others. In fact we had taken a bit of a gamble with some more downforce, which helped us in the rain, but made it more difficult for us when it was dry in the second part of the race."
To conclude, "Overall, I’m very happy with the performance we had today. There is definitely a lot of motivation. We are fighting for more interesting positions now and this is positive. We have been working well and if we keep it up, I’m sure that we will be fighting for the top places soon."
The next round will be played. The Championship will restart in two weeks, on May 2nd, with the Portuguese Grand Prix at the Autodromo Internacional do Algarve di Portimao.
Avete dato il massimo 🙌
— Scuderia Ferrari (@ScuderiaFerrari) April 18, 2021
Bravi Ragazzi ✨#Charles16 ➡️ P4 #Carlos55 ➡️ P5#essereFerrari 🔴 #ImolaGP 🇮🇹 pic.twitter.com/C9Nv8iQnfk
