Charles Leclerc, Sauber, Silverstone, 2018

Silverstone was Sauber’s best performance yet – Leclerc

2018 British Grand Prix

Posted on

| Written by and

Charles Leclerc believes the British Grand Prix was the most positive race weekend for Sauber so far this year despite the team not scoring any points.

Leclerc retired from the race with a loose wheel following a pit stop. Team mate Marcus Ericsson crashed out when he failed to close his DRS early enough at Abbey.

However Leclerc brushed off his own retirement and said the most important aspect of the weekend was the continuing improved performance of the team’s C37 chassis.

“When you push everything to the limit sometimes a mistake happens. The mechanics did a mistake but it happens to everyone so this is not a big thing.

“But definitely the positive side of it, thinking that [although] we have struggled so much, at the end it’s probably the best one of the season so far in terms of performance.

“We were close to best of the rest, especially also in qualifying, very close to the Haas until Q3 when they put something a bit more. But we are getting there.”

Leclerc believes the team’s strength is that it gets the best out of its car more consistently than its rivals.

“I keep thinking that in terms of pure potential we are still a bit behind,” he said. “But we are very good at hitting the right balance in the car, that makes the car easy to drive and that’s why we manage to get this performance.

“So if the others keep struggling with putting their car in the right balance than it might be better for us because we might achieve this. Once they get their car in the right balance I think we might struggle a bit more.

“But it depends on weekends we are very consistent at hitting the right balance so this is very positive for us. And now we only have to push a bit to the overall potential of the car and hopefully even better results will come.”

Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free

2018 F1 season

Browse all 2018 F1 season articles

6 comments on “Silverstone was Sauber’s best performance yet – Leclerc”

  1. I hope Leclerc becomes a match to Verstappen by time because there is no driver in the same league with him at the moment.

  2. I’d say France was stronger. Ericsson made Q2 with virtually 0 laps under his belt due to his crash, and Leclerc Q3 for the first time. In UK, Q3 was harder for Leclerc.

    Hoping to see them both scoring regular points, it’d be great to see Sauber climbing back up.

    1. In qualifying, yes. But Leclerc went backwards in the race in Le Castellet and barely secured 10th. In Silverstone, he was on the charge from the word go, and might’ve finished ahead of Hülkenberg if the wheel hadn’t been loose. In that respect, Silverstone was a clear step forward.

    2. Austria was good too.. both Sauber chasing Alonso, Ericsson did good there

  3. I am always impressed by his mature response to questions in all the times I’ve heard him speak. A bright star for the future of the sport and his country.

  4. Gutted to see his retirement when he was doing so well. Cheered by his rising level of performance and the resurgence of Sauber.

Comments are closed.