The race at Spa-Francorchamps saw the team score a total of 30 points thanks also to Lewis Hamilton’s fourth-place finish, which sees him move back up to second in the Drivers’ Championship.
The race. Starting on Medium tyres, Charles and Lewis both got away cleanly, with Leclerc producing an outstanding run along the Kemmel Straight, making perfect use of both energy deployment and the slipstream to overtake Max Verstappen and George Russell to run second behind Kimi Antonelli. Exiting the chicane, Hamilton and Russell made contact, the Englishman ending up in the gravel which brought out the Safety Car. Lewis’ Ferrari sustained only minor damage, allowing the Briton to continue, albeit with a five-second penalty to be served at his pit stop. On lap five, Verstappen overtook Leclerc, while four laps later Hamilton passed Oscar Piastri to move up to fourth. As the run of pit stops began, Ferrari opted to extend both drivers’ opening stint, a strategic decision that paid off on lap 19 when a Virtual Safety Car, deployed to clear debris from the track, provided the ideal opportunity to pit both drivers for Hard tyres while losing only around half the usual pit stop time. Charles rejoined in second place, behind Lando Norris, who had started on Hard tyres, and ahead of all those who had already stopped. Hamilton served his penalty and rejoined in sixth behind Piastri. On lap 23, Leclerc overtook Norris to take the lead, with Antonelli also getting past the Englishman three laps later. The Italian got ahead of Charles on lap 34, but the Monegasque remained right on his gearbox all the way to the chequered flag to claim second place. Hamilton, who had moved up to fifth after Norris made his pit stop, gained another position by overtaking Piastri on track to finish fourth, just a few seconds behind Verstappen.
Hungary before the break. Formula 1 is back in action next weekend at the Hungaroring for the Hungarian Grand Prix, the eleventh round of the season, and the final race before the summer shutdown.
Charles Leclerc #16
I believed in the possibility of taking the win until the end. I had a good start, passing George (Russell) and Max (Verstappen) out of Eau Rouge with strong deployment. The Virtual Safety Car helped to put us in contention for the win, and it was really enjoyable to lead the race and fight for that position until the closing laps, even if it was down to a bit of luck on our side. Overall, we had good pace, which is something we didn't expect on a track such as Spa-Francorchamps. A big thank you to everyone at the track and back in Maranello for continuing to push so hard.
Lewis Hamilton #44
The team did a really good job today, both with the strategy and the execution of the race, and the mechanics were excellent throughout the weekend, including during the pit stops. Given the damage, the five-second penalty and everything that happened yesterday, I'm grateful to have come away with some points. It wasn't the smoothest weekend from my side, but we'll keep building and working hard to put together stronger weekends going forward.
Fred Vasseur - Team Principal
A very good result for the team. We were able to fight at the front with Charles who had a great start and a solid pace for the entire race. As for Lewis' penalty, I feel it was definitely harsh because it was a first-lap incident, but there's no point discussing it any further. Kimi (Antonelli) had the quicker car and we were losing to him on the straights, but with a good start and the right strategy we were still able to fight. Honestly, both here and at Silverstone we have done better than expected, which says a lot about the great job the team has done to allow us to perform consistently well. Now we will focus on Budapest, which is a completely different track, where we want to finish on a positive note before the summer break.
