Charles Leclerc has admitted that he believed until the end that he could win the Formula 1 Monaco Grand Prix, having considered overtaking opportunities overnight.
Leclerc was made to rue missing out on pole position to Lando Norris as he was unable to overhaul the McLaren to repeat his triumph on home soil from last season.
Norris had appeared on course to coast to the chequered flag as he harboured a six-second advantage over Leclerc once the Ferrari driver had made his second stop.
However, Max Verstappen running an extended second stint until the penultimate lap prompted Norris to be backed into Leclerc, who was also on a softer compound.
The Monegasque got near to the McLaren’s rear on multiple occasions exiting the Nouvelle chicane, but he couldn’t break Norris’ resolve to create an opening to pass.
Leclerc reiterated his discontent at being pipped to top spot, but he recognised that it had been a positive weekend considering Ferrari’s underwhelming start to 2025.
“I’m never really happy with second place,” Leclerc told media including Motorsport Week.
“Then if you step back and you look at our season, I think this is a very positive result for the whole team.
“Especially coming here, we had very low expectations, just because our low [speed] performance has been very, very bad the whole season.
“However, I think here it’s a very specific track because there’s a lot of kerb riding, and I think our car is pretty good on that, and that helped us to close the gap.
“So yeah, I think we did a really good job, and 18 points versus the 10 of Lewis [Hamilton] are very valuable points for the situation we are in, and from that I think we should be proud.
“Am I over the moon for second place? Not really, but it’s been a very positive moment anyway.”
Leclerc spied opening that never came in Monaco
Leclerc revealed that his mind had circled through all the possible places he could mount an attack on Norris the previous night, but those openings didn’t materialise.
“When Max at the end was in front, I really believed in it until the very end,” he recalled.
“I thought about all night the two places where I could try something at Lando, and I was willing to take all the risks possible to try and get that win.
“But unfortunately these opportunities never came. Or at least I had maybe two or three laps where I thought, ‘OK, maybe I go for it’, but Lando straight away saw those and defended very well, so I basically couldn’t really go and try something. So yeah, at the end there was no opportunities for me.”
Asked where those chances were, Leclerc replied: “There were maybe two laps in Rascasse, which was the place where I was trying, and then maybe one in Fermont.”
READ MORE – Lando Norris survives Charles Leclerc pressure to take maiden Monaco F1 win
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