Leclerc joined Paul Ricard after consecutive pole positions in Monaco and Baku, but played down Ferrari’s chances of including the fight at the top if he returned to a permanent circuit.
While Carlos Sainz Jr. was able to qualify in fifth on Saturday, Leclerc struggled more through qualifying and made it into Q3 after a difficult final run in Q2.
Leclerc could be heard on team radio complaining about the front of his car in Q3 before moving into seventh place, 0.147 seconds behind Sainz’s time.
After qualifying at Paul Ricard’s print media pen, Leclerc stated that the fighting was more due to him than the car and that he had adjusted his approach to work around the problem.
“I just couldn’t get around the limitation we had all weekend because I was struggling a little with the front,” said Leclerc.
“But to be honest, more comes from me than from the car. It’s a limitation that Carlos and I had and Carlos just did a better job working around that problem and I just struggled to work around it in qualifying.
“It’s more something that comes from me that I will analyze after qualifying to understand what I could have done better with my driving style, to help the car a bit today.
“I was actually pretty happy with my last lap in Q3, because before that it was a disaster. I was very, very far away.
“I found some time in the third quarter. It wasn’t enough, but I could find a little more time. “
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari SF21
Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images
Sainz said he struggled a bit with the front tires too, believing it would be easy to get them outside of the optimal temperature window.
“Like everyone else, we are struggling with the fact that the front tires feel a little too soft,” said Sainz.
“It’s difficult to get the tires on at their peak, it’s very easy to overheat them. I tried to be disciplined, but I also struggled with it [issue]. It is not easy.
“The most important thing is that today, with every mix and every wind direction that changed during the qualifying, I knew how to adapt and change, and suddenly the lap time came.”
With the result on Saturday, Sainz had only left Leclerc behind for the second time this season. The Spaniard was grateful for a flawless qualifying as he was frustrated by red flags at the last few events, which cost him a chance of a higher starting position.
“I have to say that it was a bit of a relief today, after two or three frustrating qualifications in which I never managed to reach the full potential of the car on any lap,” said Sainz.
“When I came here, I was really looking for a clean quali. No problems, no red flags, two or three strong laps in Q2 and Q3. And that’s exactly what I managed to do today.
“From Q1 to Q2 with Medium to Q3, it was really very good laps. And yes, a bit of a relief because there have been two or three frustrating qualys lately. “
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