Leclerc uncertain about his Ferrari: 'We are strongest in Bahrain'

The Austrian racing stable was insanely dominant in 2023. The first Grand Prix of the 2024 calendar revealed once again that Red Bull is still a big step ahead of the competition. Nevertheless, several people within Ferrari were very positive about their performance in Bahrain. The team ran into a lot of problems which ultimately affected their performance, so the gap towards Red Bull no longer seemed that big at all.

Leclerc has little confidence in Jeddah

During the media day at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit, Ferrari's positivity seems to have suddenly waned. Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc dare not share any predictions about the expected speed of his car. "I don't know. I don't think this [Jeddah] is our main strength. I felt like it was more the medium speed where we were strong. I think also historically, we have always been quite strong in Bahrain. So I'll prefer to wait a few more races to judge what our weaknesses are, and what our strong points are, as it's probably too early to say for now."

The 26-year-old thinks it is too early to say whether he has the ability to challenge Max Verstappen in the title race this year. '"I think it’s what we expected more or less, maybe a little bit better. But, we need to wait and see. I think drawing conclusions after the first race is a bit too early. One thing for sure is that our focus is on the brake problems we had in the race. We've been working on it and I hope we can solve them."

At the moment, Ferrari are not yet managing to challenge Red Bull. "Not for now, but I think we are in a much better place compared to last year, where after the first race we were trying to fix the issues rather than focusing on the future and the next upgrades, whereas this year the car is in a much better place, in a place that we expected it to be. Now, we can focus on future upgrades, so that is looking better. However, for now, Max is still too far ahead," the Monegasque said.