Leclerc: “The victory in Monza was decided long before the safety car”

Charles Leclerc accepted Scuderia Ferrari’s invitation to make their first pit stop for the virtual safety car, but confirmed that today the Scuderia lacked the speed to chase Max Verstappen – who had superior race pace from the start with the Red Bull RB18 had against the Ferrari F1-75 at the Italian GP.

Since the first pit stop took little time so early, Leclerc changed his strategy from one to two pit stops, but even this strategy could not threaten the Dutchman. In fact, Leclerc said the Italian made the decision to start so early in part to be covered by Mercedes’ George Russell should the Brit go under VSC. “We didn’t know what the cars behind us would do, so we made that decision.”said the Monegasque.

The regular safety car at the end for Daniel Ricciardo’s stalled McLaren gave him one last chance but the race did not restart until the checkered flag. The McLaren start took time, as did the safety car, to catch up with Verstappen and form the grid behind him.

The protocol for such circumstances, ignored by Michael Massey in Abu Dhabi last year, has now been implemented. It provides that the race can be restarted one lap after the lapped drivers have been released. This was not possible today, there were still 5 laps to go to the checkered flag.

“Yes, the ending was irritating”, stressed Charles Leclerc at the end of the Italian GP. “I wish we could have raced at the end but unfortunately we were second at that point based on what had happened before. So it’s a shame.”

The 24-year-old continued: “Overall, I gave everything for second place today. I wish I could have won in front of the amazing fans we have here, but today I just couldn’t. With second place, I’m obviously not particularly happy about this race. But yes, we will work on that basis. I think our speed was pretty good today, it just wasn’t enough.” closed.