Charles Leclerc #16
This is not the outcome we hoped for but there was nothing we could have done to control it considering the issue we had. I got some more insight into what was happening after getting out of the car and it turns out that we had an issue on the chassis that started just about when I began to feel a difference in how the car behaved. It’s frustrating, because I think we could have won today, but we will return after the summer break and give it our all to come back stronger.
Lewis Hamilton #44
It’s been a challenging weekend and one to move on from. We weren’t able to make the progress we hoped for but I’m grateful for the effort everyone in the team put in throughout the weekend. Now we head into the break. I’ll be using the time to reset, recharge and come back stronger. I’m not where I want to be yet, but the fight’s not over - don’t count me out.
Fred Vasseur Team Principal
The weekend went pretty well at first, in the practice sessions and in quali. In the race, the first two stints of Charles were under control, the first especially was very good, Charles pulling out a gap over the McLarens and Russell. He came under a bit more pressure in the second stint and then in the final one, we were losing two seconds a lap. Now we need to understand what happened on the chassis that made the car so hard for Charles to drive. At least we got the points for fourth place because there was even some doubt that Charles could finish the race. I can understand perfectly his frustration as we were covering Piastri and he had the performance in his pocket to do it. As for Lewis, starting on Hards, he lost a couple of places and that put him in traffic in a very long DRS train, which is the worst possible scenario. That’s what decided us to go for a one-stop with him. Looking at the positives, of course yesterday we got our first pole position of the season and for the first part of the race we were matching McLaren in terms of pace and we had a 15 second lead over Russell. But then we lost everything and didn’t have the pace anymore so now we have to investigate why.
