At the start, Charles Leclerc had the chance to take the lead from Max Verstappen and fight for victory: should he have been more aggressive?
Did Charles Leclerc recklessly squander his chance of victory at the Formula 1 race in Singapore? Saturday’s Sprint had already suggested that the start might be the only chance to beat Max Verstappen in the race, as overtaking would be virtually impossible afterwards.
George Russell had overtaken the Red Bull driver at the start of the sprint and taken the lead – and Leclerc had the same opportunity when he moved in on the inside alongside Verstappen before the first corner, but in the end he was perhaps not aggressive enough. “I don’t understand Leclerc there. He should have braked later,” agrees Sky pundit Ralf Schumacher.
Leclerc himself admitted as much after the race. He insists he gave it his all and has no regrets. “I don’t think there was much more to be had today – except perhaps to be a bit more aggressive at the start,” said the Ferrari driver.
That’s why it was difficult for Leclerc
Had he pushed Verstappen off pole position there, the chances of Ferrari’s first win since Silverstone would certainly have been there. “I mean, in moments like that, you don’t have much time to think,” he reflected. ‘I just saw that Max had a bit of a difficult start.’
‘I got off to a pretty good start and pulled up alongside him. Then there wasn’t much room left, but I’d do it the same way again,’ he admits.
“I mean, I was on the left-hand side, a little way behind him. You couldn’t see the signs on the right-hand side, which means you lose all your reference points to a certain extent, because you normally have your braking points on the right-hand side,” said Leclerc. “I tried to judge it as best I could, but Max managed to defend that first place.”
Verstappen “only here to win”
It was obvious that Verstappen was determined to do just that. The Red Bull driver braked on the outside at the limit and took a huge risk: “I was only here to win,” he emphasised. “So I had to do everything I could to make sure it would be very difficult for Charles to cut deep into the corner. That was probably the only way to stop him from taking the lead.”
He’s pleased that he and Leclerc got through the first corner cleanly without making contact. “That was actually really nice, I think. But of course it’s always very difficult to judge what the right braking point is,” says Verstappen. “But I think it just worked out.”
An unexpected opportunity in the opening laps
The race seemed to be decided after that, but in fact an unexpected opportunity opened up for Leclerc in the opening laps, during which he was right on Verstappen’s tail – so unexpected that he couldn’t even capitalise on it at the time.
“There were a few opportunities in the opening laps when Max was having problems with his energy release,” he says. “But I always thought it was just a one-off, so I didn’t really use my battery – which was perhaps a mistake. And when I realised he had no power at the end of the straight, there was nothing I could do.”
“It was too late for me to use my energy,” says the Ferrari driver, frustrated. “But I don’t know if that would have made much difference. Of course, it might have helped for the first stint, but I think in the end they simply had too big a lead over us.”
Although Ferrari had been strong at the start of the race and had been able to keep up with Verstappen, “the tyres started to degrade a bit earlier in the first stint,” he says. Leclerc pitted significantly earlier than the four-time world champion, who retained the lead after his tyre change and drove comfortably ahead of the Ferraris.
During a virtual safety car period on lap 39, Leclerc took the opportunity for another tyre change and adopted a different strategy to Verstappen – but it wasn’t enough to challenge for the win. “I believed in it right until the very end, but I pushed hard at the start of the final stint and therefore put a bit more strain on the tyres than the others.”
