Although Charles Leclerc did not deny the fact that Ferrari suffered a disappointing start to its championship campaign in 2025, the Monegasque still believes that the Scuderia can turn its fortunes around.
Having started the Chinese Grand Prix from P6 on the grid, Charles Leclerc gained a place at the start, overtaking reigning champion Max Verstappen into Turn 1. However, the Monegasque made contact with his new team-mate Lewis Hamilton in Turn 2, and as a result of the incident he picked up a serious damage to his front wing endplate.
Despite considering a front wing change during the pit stop, Ferrari and Leclerc elected to continue with the damaged part as a longer pit stop would have seen Leclerc fall down the order, and the sprint race saw drivers struggle to complete an overtaking move due to the overheating front tyres and turbulent wake.
In the end, the Monegasque displayed a strong pace, and finished fifth with his damaged front wing. However, the FIA noted after the race that his SF-25 was found underweight during the post-race technical investigation.
The Jo Bauer-led FIA technical group replaced Leclerc’s damaged front wing with a spare part which was 0.2kg heavier, albeit his SF-25 was still one kg under the minimum weight limit after 2.0 litres of fuel were removed from the car. In the end, Leclerc was disqualified from the Chinese Grand Prix.
Ferrari endured a tough start to the 2025 F1 season, with both Leclerc and his team-mate Lewis Hamilton having struggled for pace in the season opening Melbourne round. The British driver then went on to take pole position for the Shanghai F1 Sprint and secured a dominant victory in the 19-lap race.
However, Leclerc and Hamilton were unable to take on the fight with Mercedes, McLaren and Red Bull in the 56-lap race in Shanghai. Explaining Ferrari’s difficult start to the 2025 F1 season, Leclerc confirmed that it has been tricky to extract the maximum from the SF-25.
“It’s as difficult as always. It’s always tricky to extract the maximum. I don’t think it’s harder this season – it’s just the performance compared to McLaren is just not good enough. It’s not about extracting the performance – it’s just that there isn’t enough of it for now. But step by step, I’m sure and confident we can close that gap, starting from this weekend hopefully.
“We saw a big step on Saturday – especially in the Sprint race with Lewis. On Sunday, I think it was back to normal. So I expect us to be more or less in line with where we were in China on Sunday and in Melbourne.
While Leclerc did not deny Ferrari’s disappointment after the opening two race weekends, the Monegasque still believes that the Scuderia can turn its fortunes around.
“If we go back to last year, looking at the first few races, the situation in terms of performance was quite a bit worse than where we are now. We kind of expected Red Bull to dominate the whole season, and by taking the points that were available at the beginning of the season with the performance we had, we ended up actually fighting for the championship – which was way above our expectations.
“There’s definitely not that feeling within the team at the moment. However, we do feel we haven’t maximized what we could have in the first two races, and that’s frustrating. But it doesn’t mean we cannot recover. The season is still very long. Small steps after small steps – we can still have an amazing season.”
