Ferrari’s Jock Clear has contended that claims prior to this season that Charles Leclerc is not as strong in race conditions as over one lap in Formula 1 were “not fair”.
Leclerc has been renowned as a single-lap specialist since he managed to seize the most pole positions on the entire grid in his debut F1 season with Ferrari in 2019.
But while he has proceeded to bag an impressive 26 pole positions to rise to 12th place on the all-time list, Leclerc has seven victories to his name in seven seasons.
The Monegasque’s low conversion rate has invited several critics to question whether he boasts the necessary all-round qualities to become a champion in the sport.
However, Clear has quashed the notion that Leclerc was ever weaker in the races, citing that he wound up being a victim of his consistent ability to excel in qualifying.
“We all know what he’s capable of, we’ve seen that over a few years now,” Clear, who is Ferrari’s Senior Performance Engineer, told F1.com.
“His reputation in qualifying has certainly been cemented over those years, in so much as people tended to say to me two years ago, three years ago ‘yeah, but he’s nowhere near as good in the race as he is in qualifying’.
“And you think, well, that’s not really fair, it’s just that he’s very, very good at qualifying.”
Ferrari’s car concept has helped Leclerc shine
Leclerc dismissed those narratives at the Italian Grand Prix as he produced a masterclass one-stop race to beat the superior McLaren cars starting from fourth place.
Clear highlighted how Ferrari’s change in car concept has made the SF-24 more competitive in race trim, giving Leclerc the platform to maximise promising grid slots.
“This year you have seen the result, really, of a development on the car side and a development on the driver side, that you recognise that there’s no points on Saturday and all the points come on Sunday,” he explained.
“Therefore I think it’s probably true that we’ve shifted our focus slightly to making the car a better race car.
“Tyre management is of course always a hot topic. But we’ve seen Charles do some very good races.
“I remember back in ’22 in Austria, where Max [Verstappen] really struggled with tyre degradation and Charles won that race with a really good drive.
“It’s not that Charles historically hasn’t been good on tyres, I think that it’s we as a combination haven’t been focussed that well on tyres.
“And so I think what we’ve seen this year is the result of us being more focussed on getting the car working really well in the race and looking after those tyres and Charles learning from previous years and honing those skills of tyre management, but also race management.”
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