He made his F-1 racing debut with Sauber in 2018. It took him a while to adapt to the handling of an F-1 car due to the rule changes for 2018 that increased the aerodynamic downforce of the cars.
“With these new F-1s, when I first drove them, what shocked me was how much understeer you need to drive them,” he recalled “You cannot drive them with the balance I used to have in F-2 because it is impossible. Last year, I did the first three races with a lot of oversteer and it just did not sit well with these cars in general. So we did a big step toward understeer for Baku because it’s a city track and we just wanted a stable rear. There is just so much more downforce that when you are losing the rear of the car you are losing a lot more downforce. That makes it difficult to get the car back and takes a lot of confidence away.”
With the new understeer setup, Leclerc finished sixth in the 2018 Azerbaijan Grand Prix. He became the first Monegasque driver to score points in a championship F-1 race since Louis Chiron finished third in the 1950 Monaco Grand Prix.
Many experts thought Ferrari made a mistake when it hired Leclerc to replace Kimi Raikkonen as Sebastian Vettel’s teammate. Yes, Raikkonen will turn 40 on Oct. 17, but the Finnish driver remains fast and he has F-1 experience stretching back to 2001.
Leclerc had been impressive during his rookie F-1 season with Sauber in 2018, but wouldn’t it have been better for him to have another year of low-key learning at Sauber (now called Alfa Romeo)?
In the end, there was a straight swap with Raikkonen going back to Alfa Romeo/Sauber where it all began for him in 2001 and Leclerc moving to Ferrari.
Leclerc was immediately impressive. During his first race with Ferrari in Australia, he finished fifth and the only reason he did not beat his four-time world champion teammate Vettel was because the team ordered him to hold station. At the next race in Bahrain, Leclerc ignored the team’s instructions to stay behind Vettel. Leclerc was on his way to winning the race when a fuel-injector malfunction dropped him to third.
Team orders are legal in F-1, but it’s a touchy subject. Leclerc will heed instructions from the team but only up to a point.
“We all have to understand that this was just the beginning of year,” he said. “What I have to do on track is to prove what I’m capable of and then, hopefully, the situation will change at one point. I’m here for that because, obviously, every driver wants to be the quickest. So that’s my target and let’s see what happens then.
“But until then, yes, I understand the decisions, even if it’s not easy for a driver to accept them,” Leclerc added. “Next to me I have a four-times world champion in his fifth year with the team. I understand it’s that way for now. But I’ll push to change things as quickly as possible for sure.
“The guys on the pit wall have a lot more information than I do in the car. Whatever I am told I will do, up to a certain point at least.”
Leclerc looked back at his first Monaco Grand Prix.
“My first memory of the Monaco Grand Prix … I was probably about 4,” Leclerc recalled. “I always kept this image in my head: I was at a friend’s apartment by turn one, playing with the small cars, watching the grand prix at the same time. I think Michael (Schumacher) was at Ferrari … obviously watching the red cars more than the others … just enjoying and dreaming of being there one day.”
Ironically, Leclerc has never had any luck racing at home. His first races on the streets of the principality were in Formula 2 in 2017, but he retired in both the feature and sprint rounds.
In the F-1 race last year, he retired after brake problems sent him into another car. This year, a strategy mistake by the Ferrari team meant that he started the grand prix in 15th place. It’s virtually impossible to overtake on the narrow Monaco streets, but Leclerc pulled off several passes before tangling with Nico Hulkenberg and retiring with accident damage.
It was his first DNF and first race with no points in his first six outings with Ferrari.
While Ferrari had the legs on Mercedes in Bahrain, and should have been better in Azerbaijan, the general trend in the first part of the season was that Mercedes had the better car. Combine that with mistakes by Ferrari, both the drivers and the team, and Mercedes with Hamilton and Bottas won the first six rounds.
Ferrari was struggling getting the tires into the correct temperature window and the car lacked grip, which in turn upset the overall balance of the chassis.
“Unfortunately, it hasn’t been the start of the season we wished,” Leclerc lamented. “We’ve had quite a bit of disappointment since the beginning of the season, but we need to keep our heads up, keep working as best as we possibly can and the results will eventually come.”