Leclerc won in some style in Austin after passing the title contenders
Charles Leclerc says he had a “lonely race” to victory in the Formula 1 US GP – and he hopes to reproduce that form in the future.
Leclerc qualified only fourth but he got ahead of team mate Carlos Sainz before jumping Lando Norris and Max Verstappen when the pair ran wide at the exit of the first corner as they fought each other.
Once in front Leclerc soon established a healthy lead that ensure he was never under threat, and later in the race he had Sainz riding shotgun in second.
“It feels really good as every victory feels special for its own reason,” he said. “And obviously from the start I felt really good with the car.
“I was quite confident from yesterday, because even though there were quite a lot of fights yesterday, the car felt great, and we knew that we had a good race pace.
“We were a little bit more sceptical about qualifying but P4 was good. And then after that start, when I got out of Turn 1 into first, I knew that it was all about trying to use the pace of the car that we had yesterday, and trying to take care of those tyres.
“And the car felt great. So from that moment onwards, it was a bit of a lonely race, but it’s a good kind of lonely. And I hope we can reproduce that in the future.”
Expanding on the start he said: “I knew that Max and Lando would be very aggressive towards each other. I mean, they are fighting for the championship. I got a good start.
“I saw that Max was going towards the inside as well as Lando and I was like, ‘I’m just going to prepare the exit of the corner’, which was obviously a winning bet. And from that moment onwards, then I could focus on my own race.
Leclerc admitted that it was difficult to judge the car’s form from race to race.
“I wish I could tell you exactly, but it’s always difficult because we rely on very small gaps that could make a big difference,” he said. “So it’s very difficult to predict where we will be in the next few races.
“However, we’ve said since two or three races in Monza, in Baku, in Singapore, we brought a few upgrades, and we were always waiting for Austin because it was going to be the real test for those upgrades.
“And it seems to be working all good. So that is positive for the future. It doesn’t mean that we’ll be having every Sunday the way it’s been today, but it means that we are working in the right direction, and that can only be positive. So I hope we can reproduce these kind of results more often.”
Ferrari now lies 48 points behind McLaren in the World Championship with five races left to run.
“We’ve got to target winning the constructors’ title,” said Leclerc. “It’s an optimistic goal, but that’s what we are here for. So, yeah, we’ll do the math at the end of the season. Until then, I think the best thing we can do is to focus on ourselves, on our own performance, just like we did this weekend.
“It’s been a really good weekend for the team and for the constructors’ title. And we’ll try and reproduce that as often as possible. And hopefully at the end of the year, when we do the math, we will have won the constructors’ title.”
He downplayed his own chances of winning the drivers’ championship: “I mean, never say never. Let’s say that for the constructors, if we do everything perfect until the end of the season, no matter what McLaren does, if we do better than them, I think we can still clinch that title.
“With the drivers’, I see it a bit in a different way. Even if we do everything perfect, I feel like it will require a little bit of luck inside that to try and get that title, and we cannot really rely on luck. So the drivers’ seems to be quite unlikely. But again, I’ll believe in it until it’s mathematically impossible. But trickier.”
Adam Cooper F1 