Ferrari suspects a ‘mis-combustion’ on one cylinder of Charles Leclerc’s engine was to blame for his regression to third place during the closing stages of Formula 1’s Bahrain Grand Prix.
Leclerc started from pole position and quickly re-took the lead in the wake of falling to third position on the opening lap.
The youngster opened a 10-second lead over Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton after the final round of stops and looked set for his maiden victory in the championship.
Bahrain GP: Race Result | Drivers' Standings | Constructors' Standings
But with 13 laps to go he lost substantial straight-line speed and was helpless to prevent both Hamilton and the other Mercedes of Valtteri Bottas from cruising past.
“We are checking now the engine, so we do not have a clear explanation yet of what happened,” said Ferrari Team Principal Mattia Binotto.
“It is an engine problem, we had mis-combustion on one cylinder but it is yet to be understood.
“We do not know the source of the problem and the engine will be back in Maranello for careful checks, because when something such happens you need to take your time to do all your checks carefully.
“But the engine was running at the end of the race, so it is still able to run, and we will use it certainly on Friday in China when we will have an entire Friday to assess its behaviour, functionality and its performance.”
Speculation arose during the race that an MGU-H issue was at fault but Binotto ruled out such a failure as the cause.
“I don’t know where the rumours have come from but there was nothing wrong with the MGU-H,” he said.
“When something like this happens you try to recover any combustion control or you try to change mapping or try to change setting to make sure you can find something better but that was not the case today so we have to manage the race like that.
“I think it has been a brave decision to continue racing in those conditions but at the end it was third place so probably the right decision.”
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