After the finish of the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Charles Leclerc was, to say the least, bitter about the way his teammate Carlos Sainz had acted after his second pit stop, ignoring the instruction not to attack the Monegasque. to overtake him a few turns later.
This situation was not well received by Leclerc, who spoke strong words on the radio, saying in particular: “I did my job but by being nice I get fucked every fucking time, every fucking time. It's not even being nice, it's just being respectful.”
Asked about the subject after the race, Ferrari director Frédéric Vasseur did not want to give much importance to this outburst of anger from his driver: “I'm not worried at all. I think, again, it's always the same story: they make comments or they don't. They make comments during the deceleration lap and they don't don't always have an overview. We'll discuss it and it won't be a problem.”
The starting point of this situation was the early stop of Carlos Sainz on the 28th lap – one lap after changing his mind – which gave him three laps to undercut his teammate whom he had just let pass and leave following an instruction. When Leclerc stopped in turn, he came out of the pit lane just in front of the Spaniard, who had the tires up to temperature and the opportunity to attempt a maneuver with the help of DRS, which he did done at turn 4.
The situation was really complicated for everyone.
“We have to avoid fighting, but at this point I think starting the relay you have to be in management, and Carlos was already on the third or fourth lap in this relay”adds Vasseur. “I think it's more the fact that the situation was really complicated for everyone, but we'll discuss it tonight. It won't be a problem.”
Regarding the moment of hesitation about Sainz's last stop, the Frenchman explains: “When we discussed the pit stop with Carlos, I explained to him that he was in the shadow of [Liam] Lawson, perhaps [Yuki] Tsunoda, et […] that we wanted to keep him on the track [pour éviter qu’il ne se retrouve derrière eux à la sortie des stands]. “We had a discussion and we had to swap our drivers' places, which caused some chaos, but when they are in the car they have their own vision of the race.”
With Filip Cleeren and Jake Boxall-Legge
VIDEO – SUMMARY: The best moments of the Las Vegas GP
