Leclerc resigned to “tricky” race despite starting from pole position

Despite taking pole position for the second time this year, Charles Leclerc is pessimistic about his chances of victory in the Belgian Grand Prix.

Leclerc inherited pole position after qualifying second behind Max Verstappen, who has a 10-place grid penalty for a power unit change. In a rain-affected qualifying session, Leclerc pipped Sergio Perez and Lewis Hamilton by less than a tenth of a second.

Perez had no fresh intermediate tyres left by the time he reached Q3, and Hamilton used his only fresh set early in the final stage as Mercedes expected further rainfall. Leclerc said Ferrari got their tactics spot-on for qualifying.

“We didn’t change the balance that much from Q1 to Q3,” he said. “I think where we improved quite a bit was to put the tyres in the right window. That was super important and in those conditions that’s always where you struggle.

“So on this we did some modifications especially on the out-lap and how much you push and where you push. And then I felt more at ease, and that helped me for Q3. It was all about fine-tuning the out lap and putting the tyres in the right window.”

He admitted pole position came as a surprise. “when I finished the lap, I didn’t feel like it was worth a second place,” said Leclerc. “It was a good lap, a clean lap, and that’s what you need in those conditions. And I believe that especially when you get to Q3 in the last lap, everybody knows that this is the lap, and that pushes people to maybe do more mistakes.

“On my side, it was a clean lap, but not an incredible lap. So I’m very happy to be P2 but I definitely did not expect that. I think as a team today P5 will have been a bit of a good result.”

But having seized his opportunity to claim the best position on the grid, Leclerc is doubtful about Ferrari’s chances in the race, not least because he lost the lead to Perez when the pair started from the same positions 12 months ago.

“It’s going to be a tricky race for us,” said Leclerc. “It will be dry conditions and in dry conditions recently we’ve been struggling a little bit more.

“The McLaren is a bit further away [on pace] than what we wanted. There’s Checo right behind. That will be the main target, and then we’ll see how it goes after the first stint.

“But it’s a good starting position. It’s also a track where you can overtake quite easily, so we’ll need the pace, and that we’ll only have the answer tomorrow.”

“But as I said we don’t have any magical solution for the race pace and it will be a bit of a tricky day tomorrow,” he added.

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