Within the warmth of the second, Charles Leclerc labelled Ferrari’s choice to ship him out on the flawed tyres in qualifying for the Brazilian Grand Prix as “f—— unbelievable”, however later revealed he had accepted the tyre alternative earlier than heading out on monitor in Q3.
Utilizing intermediate tyres when the remainder of the highest ten have been on slicks proved pricey for Leclerc and left him tenth on the grid for Saturday’s dash race.
The monitor was solely dry sufficient for slick tyres initially of Q3 and by the point Ferrari recognised its error and ordered Leclerc again into the pits, he had already began a flying lap on the intermediate tyres, which he finally aborted.
A clearly annoyed Leclerc held again in his post-race interviews, however had let his emotions identified over workforce radio when he returned to the pits after George Russell had induced a pink flag by spinning into the gravel.
“Did everybody full a lap on slicks?” Leclerc requested his engineer over the workforce radio.
“Sure, they did,” got here the reply.
“Unbelievable,” Leclerc added. “F—— unbelievable.”
Requested what went flawed after the session, Leclerc mentioned: “We have been anticipating some rain that by no means got here. I’ll communicate with the workforce and attempt to perceive what we will do higher in these circumstances. It is actually disappointing, the tempo was there.”
Ferrari’s sporting director Laurent Mekies mentioned the workforce was playing on rain with Leclerc, however selected to separate the methods in order that teammate Carlos Sainz went out on slick tyres.
“It is the form of qualifying the place it’s a must to make plenty of calls, a number of the ones we made immediately labored, some labored much less properly,” he mentioned. “It was a bit irritating as a result of we received each automobiles into Q3 after which we have been confronted with plenty of selections: on one facet you’ve gotten the monitor nonetheless being dry — and there’s a golden rule that claims it’s best to go for the tyres to go well with the monitor whether it is dry — however then again we have been anticipating heavy rain instantly.
“On the finish of the day, we’ve cut up our automobiles since you are all the time know at that very second that relying on the precise timing of the rain there may be going to be one completely satisfied man and one not so completely satisfied man. And that’s precisely what occurred as a result of the rain got here a minute too late for Charles.”
Leclerc was second within the queue leaving the pits in Q3 and solely behind the Haas of Kevin Magnussen, who took a shock pole place by setting a time on slick tyres earlier than the rain hit.
To be able to be in direction of the entrance of the queue, Ferrari needed to decide comparatively early to provide Leclerc sufficient time to drive down the pit lane, which meant the workforce had not seen which tyres its rivals had chosen earlier than sending him out.
With rain forecast, Ferrari opted for intermediates and took second within the queue, however finally misplaced out.
“I accepted the choice to go on inters after which I used to be simply ready for the rain that by no means got here,” Leclerc added.