racer says his automotive’s particular low-speed weak point means it will be extraordinarily tough to this weekend.
Final 12 months, Leclerc lastly discovered redemption across the streets he roamed as a baby, taking his first dwelling win from pole after a number of years of heartbreak and near-misses.
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The favored win led to emotional scenes after the race as Ferrari’s season received off to an encouraging begin with one win apiece for Leclerc and former team-mate , in addition to seven additional podiums. That was earlier than stole a march on the remainder of the sphere and Ferrari suffered a dip in type, which it recovered from by the tip of the 12 months.
However the Scuderia has not met targets for its 2025 automotive and has been nicely behind McLaren, whereas additionally being outscored by and in the one frontrunning Pink Bull.
Whereas Ferrari remains to be laborious at work trying to salvage its season quite than specializing in 2026 – with extra upgrades coming in Barcelona – the SF-25’s most important weak point in slow-speed corners has been a key attribute that’s set to be punished across the slim confines of the Principality, rendering Leclerc far more pessimistic about his probabilities this time.
When requested how he rated his probabilities to struggle for an additional dwelling win, Leclerc replied: “If you’d like an trustworthy reply, then low, as a result of sadly our automotive hasn’t been notably robust in low-speed corners and there’s solely low-speed corners right here in Monaco.
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“On paper, it doesn’t appear to be probably the most promising observe for us. However Monaco is so distinctive and so completely different from something we race on over the season that we will have a great shock as soon as we put the automotive down tomorrow – which I hope will occur.
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari
Charles Leclerc, FerrariGabriel Bouys / AFP / Getty Photos
Gabriel Bouys / AFP / Getty Photos
“And if it does, then I hope to be there on Saturday as a result of qualifying will stay a very powerful a part of the weekend. However on paper, it’s going to be a tricky one.”
With Monaco being so distinctive when it comes to nook layouts, tarmac and bumps, the same old guidelines do not all the time apply right here, which is leaving the door ajar for Leclerc.
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“There’s been years the place we positively didn’t anticipate to be on pole, and once you assume that you’ve got zero hopes, you simply go for it – perhaps somewhat bit greater than individuals which are making an attempt to handle expectations in Q3. And also you handle to do one thing particular, like we did in 2021 the place we had been nowhere all season, however we managed to place it on pole right here.
“So, I nonetheless have hopes that we will reproduce what occurred final 12 months. Clearly, it is nonetheless very contemporary in my thoughts to come back again on this paddock. The final time I used to be there, we received, and it was a really particular second for me.”
With Monaco set-ups so singularly targeted on low-speed efficiency, it means groups have to fret a lot much less about discovering a balanced set-up that’s performing throughout wildly completely different nook sorts. That may very well be a technique for Ferrari to search out efficiency the place it isn’t anticipating it.
“That’s positively one of many questions we additionally requested ourselves coming right here,” Leclerc agreed. “The reply, we’ll have it on observe tomorrow.
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“We don’t actually know but what to anticipate. However it’s true that there’s solely low-speed right here. So clearly, we’ll attempt to focus and put the automotive in one of the best place potential for low-speed corners, whereas usually on most different tracks you simply attempt to discover a compromise between high-speed and low-speed.
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“I hope we’ll uncover one thing new about our automotive that we haven’t seen but because the starting of the season.”
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A banner representing Ferrari’s Monegasque driver Charles Leclerc as a Saint
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