Charles Leclerc admits that Ferrari has to “do something special” in the Qatar GP in order to gain points on McLaren in the fight for the constructors’ title.
The Maranello team lost a further six points in Saturday’s sprint, leaving the gap at 30 heading into today’s main event.
Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri will start third and fourth, behind George Russell and Max Verstappen, while Leclerc is fifth and his team mate Carlos Sainz seventh.
“Honestly, today was the best we could do,” said the Monegasque driver. “I was really happy with both of my laps. There was very little between them, I think two or three hundredths. There wasn’t anything more in the car tonight.
“I honestly think that we are much closer than what we thought, compared to McLaren. However, compared to Mercedes and Red Bull, it’s another story. It was surprising for us to see them so fast.
“We did not expect them to be so strong. McLaren, we expected them to be better compared to us. So all in all, we are fighting McLaren, so we have a good race pace and tomorrow everything is possible.”
Leclerc said the target had to be to get ahead of the McLarens in the race.
“We still had hope that we could turn the situation around,” he said. “Because at the end, if we want to win the constructors’, we’ve got to finish in front this weekend, and we cannot afford to just take the points available.
“We need to overperform in order to target the constructors. So, yeah, tomorrow we’ve got to do something special in order to gain some points on them.”
He added: “I think we’ve got a good race pace. We’ve got to have a good start, because I don’t think our race pace is enough to overtake on track.
“So definitely strategy and race starts will be key moments for us in order to gain positions on the McLarens.”
Adam Cooper F1 