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Leclerc explains misheard “cat” Baku F1 sprint radio message
Behind the safety car during Saturday’s sprint, the Ferrari driver appeared to sound the alarm that the power unit had been cut, publicly disclosing it via on-screen graphics on television.
Asked about his comments about “cutting in” in his official post-sprint press conference, Leclerc clarified that he was actually talking about a cat running through the path of the safety car.
The feline interloper caused the safety car to brake briefly, which was reported by race leader Leclerc by radio.
Asked whether misidentified wounds would be a recurring problem, Leclerc replied: “Absolutely not. I’m talking about a cat, it’s different!
“There was a cat in the middle of the road and the safety car had to stop, but I thought I might be the only one who saw it.
“But yeah, there was a cat coming out of Turn 1, the safety car braked. It’s not bad, but I feel like I have to say it!”
Leclerc explained that Ferrari’s performance at the Australian Grand Prix was taken to the next level, which he said earlier in the weekend provided the team with a breakthrough setup.
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari SF-23
Photography: Andrew Ferraro / motorsport pictures
He warned the team still needed to “find something” in the race, having performed well in both qualifying sessions at the Baku circuit to secure pole for the sprint and grand prix.
But once the Red Bull driver used DRS, he fell behind eventual champion Sergio Perez, and the gap continued to widen as Leclerc tried to keep the tires alive.
“I didn’t know that race well, but I tried my best,” Leclerc explained.
“We’re still lacking some pace in the game and that’s definitely what we’re focusing on at the moment. It’s been a long time now.
“So we’re working on that, trying to find something for the race. In qualifying we seemed to be doing fine – having said that, I believe we’ve taken a step forward.
“If you look at Australia and here, we’re better. We’re not at Red Bull’s level yet, so there’s a lot of work to be done, but I’m more happy with the car.
“Once you start with tire degradation, that’s when Checo starts to disappear. Max (Verstappen) starts to come back. From that moment on, we had a little bit of a disadvantage.”
Since you can get 26 points, why should you be satisfied with 25 points? That was Max Verstappen’s mind as he successfully attempted to set the fastest lap in the closing stages of the Spanish Grand Prix.
McLaren driver Norris scored a season-best third in Spain, but he won when he clashed with Hamilton’s Mercedes on the first lap and had to pit at the end of the opening round. Hopes for points were dashed.
Hamilton escaped without major damage and went on to finish second.
After his final 17th place, Norris stressed that even before the touch, he expected points struggles due to McLaren’s continued struggles with speed and the position of several drivers further out.
Mercedes driver George Russell recovered from 12th to third, while Sergio Perez’s Red Bull team moved from 11th to fourth on the grid.
Norris said: “The pace today was as expected, which is bad. I don’t think we were really expecting anything else.
“Our aim was to possibly score points, but we didn’t expect it to be like yesterday.”
Asked if points would have been possible without Hamilton’s influence, Norris replied: “Probably not, no.”
He then added: “Because we’re slow, we’ve had a full year. I don’t know, there’s nothing to say.
“Yesterday was a special day. Some good teams struggled and some worse teams did better, so it was just a weird day, people made a lot of mistakes and we just took advantage of that.
Lando Norris and the grid mechanic for the McLaren MCL60
Photography: Jack Grant / motorsport pictures
“Other than that, we’ve been behind all season and struggled for points halfway through the race. It was the same thing today. People expected us to have a very tough day today.
“We’re obviously nowhere near Alpine, Aston or all these top five, top six teams.
“It’s pointless to think ‘we’re going to score points’ because we’re not going fast enough.”
Explaining the clash with Hamilton, Norris said it was sparked by Hamilton checking to avoid Max Verstappen and Carlos Sainz as they recovered from off-track runs while battling for the lead going into Turn 1. .
Norris described it as “just a racing incident”, explaining: “I did see Max go off the track at Turn 1, go a little wide, so he had to roll over the curb at Turn 2 and then Everyone checked it out.
“I was too close to Lewis to react and brake and all that. So it was just an unfortunate moment. Lewis was fine, he didn’t do anything wrong.”
Max Verstappen has 26 points after the weekend’s Spanish Grand Prix. Helmut Marko is very pleased with his driver’s fifth victory of the season. Afterwards, the 80-year-old Austrian veteran also talked about Verstappen’s insistence on driving the fastest time.
Verstappen went for fastest lap despite warning: 'Knew it could be done'
Norris didn’t expect F1 points in Spain even before Hamilton clash
Marko on excelling Verstappen: 'Apart from that it was perfect'
Leclerc missing out on points in Spain: ‘Will analyse what went wrong'
Barcelona exposed Ferrari’s F1 tyre weakness
Q2 off left Perez “unsettled” ahead of final F1 qualifying run
Charles Leclerc starts from the pit lane
Barcelona F1 qualifying pace a ‘confirming moment’ for Alpine
Red Bull played it safe: "Just in case Lewis pulled something out the bag"
Perez defeated after 'calamitous' performance: 'Verstappen pearless to P1'
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