Charles Leclerc says he misjudged how the Azerbaijan Grand Prix was going to play out and thought he would be capable to re-pass Oscar Piastri to beat the McLaren after being overtaken.
Piastri had dropped almost six seconds adrift of Leclerc previous to the pit stops in Baku, however closed up on the out lap on exhausting tires and rapidly pulled off a scientific transfer into Flip 1 to take the lead. Leclerc says he may see Piastri would possibly attempt to overtake on that event however that he wasn’t overly apprehensive, believing the race would come again in direction of him in a while.
“Not likely without warning, as a result of he wasn’t fully straight behind me,” Leclerc mentioned. “He was slightly bit on the left. So I may see in my mirrors that he was there and that it was a risk for him to go there. However I couldn’t actually be tremendous aggressive. I nonetheless had chilly tires. I used to be actually struggling to get these tires into temperature.
“I simply thought it wasn’t that a lot of a giant deal if he would overtake me at that time of the race as a result of the race was nonetheless lengthy and the DRS would assist me to remain inside a second of him after which as soon as my tires might be in temperature I may overtake him once more. However that was a misjudgment from my aspect.”
Piastri was capable of preserve Leclerc at bay after which pulled away from the Ferrari within the closing laps, with Leclerc believing the distinction in automobile set-ups additionally performed a component in him being unable to regain the lead.
“It’s been a reasonably irritating race. We ran two totally different configurations. They’d a decrease downforce bundle. We had a bit extra downforce, which made us fairly fast within the fortress part. Nonetheless, on all of the straights they had been flying. And that’s most likely the place I misplaced the race. I misjudged that.
“And when Oscar overtook me into Flip 1, I used to be not too apprehensive. I simply needed to remain throughout the DRS, preserve my tires, and try an overtake in a while. Nonetheless, this chance by no means actually arose once more, simply because we had been too sluggish within the straights. Yeah, that was a small misjudgment, which had a giant consequence.
“So generally it hurts, and it does, however it’s the way in which it’s. Then again, it’s been a reasonably good final couple of races by way of efficiency. This weekend hasn’t been nice, as a result of clearly we’ve bought Carlos [Sainz] that was in a great place that didn’t handle to complete the race. However throughout the crew, we’re in a great place in a great temper and we have to preserve pushing in that course.”
