Sauber’s Charles Leclerc says he will try and learn from his mistake at the French Grand Prix, which he felt cost him a shot at ninth position.
Leclerc was chasing Haas’ Kevin Magnussen when he went wide at the Verrerie S, losing four seconds, after which he was overhauled by Renault’s Nico Hulkenberg.
Leclerc came home in 10th place to record another point, but accepted he had been caught out and vowed to heed the lessons.
“I’m a little bit disappointed with myself as I think overall we did a great race, myself and the team, but I did a mistake following Kevin,” he said.
“I wanted to put pressure on him, I came back in the DRS zone and lost the car in Turn 2 being too close to him and then Nico overtook us so we lost quite a bit of time there and lost one place.
“It’s a bit of a shame but we’ve had a smooth run in the last four or five races without many mistakes so sometimes it happens and I will try to learn from it to get better
“I don’t think we could have done a lot better than ninth, probably one point more was the potential today but yeah.”
Sauber team-mate Marcus Ericsson came home out of the points in 13th spot, and boss Frederic Vasseur expressed satisfaction with the outfit’s gains.
“It has been a positive weekend for us,” he said. “We had good pace in qualifying, and increased our pace step by step.
“Both of our drivers fought in the midfield during the race, and we are making good progress as a team.
“It is important for us to keep pushing and stay in the fight with our direct competition in the races ahead.”
