Charles Leclerc has revealed that Ferrari has identified a solution to the engine issue that compromised his Canadian Grand Prix to ensure a repeat doesn’t transpire.
Leclerc was aiming to recover from a torrid qualifying that put him and team-mate Carlos Sainz down the order when a power unit problem hit him on the second lap.
The Monegasque was told the gremlin was costing him up to five-tenths each lap on the straights and he became powerless to defend once the track later dried out.
Although a complete reset at a pit stop would override the hitch, Leclerc retired from the race as a premature gamble on slicks witnessed him end up over a lap down.
However, Leclerc has divulged that Ferrari has since understood the issue back at its Maranello base and come up with the remedies to prevent a recurrence in Spain.
Asked in Barcelona whether the team had found a permanent solution since Canada, Leclerc told media including Motorsport Week: “No, we found a solution.
“I’m not going to go into the details of what was in it exactly, but obviously we were using a lot of lap time in the straights, which pushed us to retire the car.
“This was difficult to control until we actually understood now what went wrong. We understood, we fixed it.”
Instead, Leclerc explained how the Italian marque’s main focus going into the upcoming triple header was examining its lacklustre pace at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve.
“The thing that we have been focusing most in the last few days since we understood the engine issue was mostly the lack of performance on the Saturday, which again here I think we didn’t manage things the way we should have had and there was probably more performance in the car so I’m confident that we’ll be back to our level here in Barcelona.”
Leclerc also had engine scares in Miami and Imola which prompted Ferrari to take precautions and switch units, but he has denied that he is worried about reliability.
However, the Monegasque driver has suggested that he will be in line to take a grid drop at some stage later in the season to take on fresher power unit components.
“We are not concerned,” he added.
“Of course there’s been quite a few movements with the engine lately and we are evaluating absolutely everything but no concern for now.
“We are just playing with the engines we have in the pool and then we’ll see after this race.
“I think this race will be an important one for us to assess everything and then we’ll see.”
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