Leclerc: "If I miss out on the title by 32 points, I know who to blame"
Charles Leclerc threw away a possible victory at the French Grand Prix with what looked like a driver error. His rival, Max Verstappen, took the win and consequently lost out on the championship. Leclerc knows who to blame if he does not take the title this year.
Leclerc was at the front of the race and had just parried the initial attacks from Verstappen. Without the pressure of an attacking driver behind him, the Monegasque lost the rear of his car in the corner and slid into the wall. Over the radio, Leclerc immediately shouted something about problems with his accelerator, referring to the problems he had in the closing stages of the race in Austria. After getting out of the car and appearing in front of the cameras later, Leclerc changed his story: "It was a mistake.
One person guilty if Leclerc does not win title
Not much more became clear from his short answer, but in the meantime, we can say that it was a driver error on the part of the Ferrari driver. Team boss Mattia Binotto has already said that it was a real mistake, which Leclerc will probably learn a lot from. The driver admitted his own mistake to Sky Italia: "The reverse gear didn't work once at the barriers, but I don't want to shift the focus to that. I can't make these mistakes, no need to be at this level if I make mistakes like that."
Leclerc seems to admit that losing 25 points against rival Verstappen hurt him a lot and seems to blame himself heavily: "If I lose by 32 points (referring to this error and Imola) I will know whose fault it is. There are no excuses. I yelled, I didn't think the radio was on but that's life."
He doesn’t have his math in order. Today he didn’t lose 25 points in comparison to winning, but he lost 32. That’s the difference between plus 7 vs Max (assuming Max would be 2nd) and now -25.
Max was prone to errors before. Now he’s a consistency machine. Leclerc is exceptional. Nearly as fast as Max and, I think, a more cunning racer. But he needs to learn from Max’s consistency, be an unstoppable train like his rival. As a massive Leclerc fan, I think he might not deserve this year’s title as much as Max. He has these last few issues to iron out.
Massively disappointed though. It’s a bit more painful for me as a fan to see the driver make the mistake, rather than a reliability issue.
Max was never prone to errors. He's shown this consistency since his days in karting. Charles has always been prone to mistakes.
Disappointing, but with Ferraris continous blunders Charles will lose by more than 32 points!
Very sad race for Tifosis. I see both titles slipping away and i see us fighting Mercs more than RB. LIke i predicted, Mercs lack quali pace but at times match race pace of Ferrari n RB and they are more reliable.
This just reminds me of the turning point in the championship fight in 2018 when Seb crashed while in the lead at Hockenheim. He seemed to be totally out of the fight with Hami after that incident.
He is very upset with himself, i can understand this, but Charles is still hands down an exceptional driver with blistering pace. Just look at how he compares to Carlos in raw speed this year. He has all the ingredients, but he lacks one thing: Michael Schumacher said this about 20 plus years ago: "we win together, we lose together". He meant it too. This kind of mentality made him better, but also made his team better. It is also true that he had Ross Brawn and Jean Todt beside him, not Mattia Binotto. Even so, the reality is Ferrari made more mistakes than Charles this year, but Michael would have found a solution to make himself and the team learn from mistakes. Charles doesn't have this leadership yet. He is still young, i am positive he will eventually find it. When he does, i can guarantee he will become World Champion.
Even with his two mistakes, if Ferrari was reliable like Mercedes, and the strategies were better we would see Charles now neck to neck with Max or maybe even leading the championship.
If I was Binotto I would focus on 2023, fix the engine issues, hire some other strategists and go for it again.
That is likely going to be the case but Ferrari will still win races in 2022 as well. I expect them to be very strong in Hungary.
Definitely yes, also Mexico, Holland, Singapore I can see Ferrari being faster there
Leclerc is so good but does tend to press and make mistakes. At least he owns it rather than playing the blame game we hear so often.
Wrong...
If you dont win the title Charles...only Max is to blame! ?
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