'Huge Surprise If We Do Pole Position Tomorrow': Leclerc Calms Expectations Ahead Of Mexico

Saturday, 28 October 2023 at 19:00

Scuderia Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc was disappointed with the pace of his car in comparison to McLaren and Red Bull after the first practice session of the 2023 Mexico City Grand Prix weekend.

Charles Leclerc finished Free Practice session one in fifth place behind Red Bull drivers, Alex Albon on Williams and Lando Norris on Mclaren.

The characteristic of a Free Practice session is that drivers run various setups with different tires and fuel loads, so it is hard to estimate the pace of different cars.

In the second practice session, Leclerc finished in P3 after Verstappen and Norris. His teammate Sainz finished in P11. However, Leclerc did not seem happy with the Ferrari's performance so far when he told the media:

“"Yeah, we still have a lot of work to do as the McLaren seems to be extremely strong, obviously the Red Bull and Max seem to be very strong."”

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Both Mercedes cars have been outside of the top 10 in FP1. In FP2, Lewis Hamilton finished P7, while George Russell finished the session in tenth place.

The results of the Mercedes team in the first two practice sessions did not seem quite competitive. On the other hand, Leclerc thinks it is hard to estimate where the Silver Arrows stand.

“"The Mercedes seem to be a bit difficult to read into now, but focusing on ourselves, we know the areas we need to work on and hopefully that will help us to do a step forward for tomorrow"”

Overall, the Monegasque driver concluded he would be very surprised to stand in the pole position at Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez as he did in Austin last week.

“"It will be a huge surprise if we do pole position tomorrow but never say never. It’s a tricky track, it’s difficult to put the lap together but I feel this weekend we are a bit too far away."”