After crashing heavily in second practise on Friday, Leclerc admitted he was taking things "step by step" in order to rebuild his confidence.
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Charles Leclerc said he thought he’d “lost the car” on his final lap of qualifying for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix before catching his Ferrari and maintaining momentum to finish fourth on the grid – while teammate Carlos Sainz was left to rue a spin that cost him a spot in the top 10. After crashing heavily in second practise on Friday, Leclerc admitted he was taking things “step by step” in order to rebuild his confidence, but decided to throw everything into his final lap in Q3 – and it paid off.
“I’m a bit more than pretty happy,” he said. “It’s only qualifying, and the race is tomorrow but after yesterday it was difficult to come back today and just be confident in the car.”
“I took it step by step and in that last lap in Q3 I just went for it, especially in Turn 22. I really thought I had lost the car [but] I caught it and I gained a lot of lap time compared to the lap before. I’m just really happy to start P4, and I hope we can maximise that result tomorrow in the race,” the Monegasque added.
Leclerc admitted that it was going to be tricky during the race but remains optimistic about the pace of his Ferrari.
On Saturday, his teammate Carlos Sainz appeared to be the stronger of the two Ferrari racers, with the Spaniard dominating in Q1. However, after having a lap deleted due to track limits on his first run in Q2, he lost control of the car through Turn 11, damaging the rear wing endplate.
“It’s a bit of a shame, as I was coming from a very strong FP3, a very strong Q1 and suddenly this snap in the middle of Turn 11 cost me a whole qualifying as in the end, it meant I stabbed the wall with the rear end-plate, which I actually didn’t feel in the car. And then when I look in my mirror, the end plate is completely bent and the rear wing is not delivering the downforce it should,” Sainz said.
“It is something to analyse, something to look into what I could have done differently as it’s a snap of oversteer that I was not expecting. This corner has been flat for me for the whole of qualifying, and for some reason in that lap, I lost the rear, but we’ll look at it and come back from it,” he added.
After inspecting the damage, the team was able to get him back out, but there wasn’t enough time for a full wing change, and he was ultimately unable to improve. The Spaniard, on the other hand, isn’t letting it shake his self-esteem.
“Even with rear wing bent like it was, I was coming on a very strong lap before the rear wing properly gave up,” said Sainz, who ended up 15th-fastest. “Confidence has been there all weekend, it’s been there the last four weekends actually. I’ve been really strong in qualifying, Q1 here I was really strong so, one small bump in the road, but honestly I feel comfortable.”
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