Scuderia Ferrari Monegasque driver Charles Leclerc will have to take a grid penalty in the second round of the 2023 Formula One campaign, the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, due to the technical failure that forced him to retire from the Bahrain Grand Prix, two weeks ago.
The Maranello team had to change the control electronics and energy store in Charles Leclerc’s engine before the start of the season opener at the Bahrain International Circuit as a precautionary measure, but the Monegasque still encountered issues during the race and had to stop the car on the side of the track while running in P3.
Based on the current rules and regulation, drivers only have two available to them during the entire championship, while using any additional element means taking an automatic 10-place grid penalty each.
After evaluating the components back in the Maranello factory, Team Principal Frederic Vasseur revealed that Charles Leclerc would need to take a third control electronics unit for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix
“Unfortunately we’ll have to take the penalty in Jeddah because we have only a pool of two control [electronics] units for the season,” the French manager confirmed.
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Fred Vasseur added that the issue was something the Maranello team has never experienced in the past with those elements: “On Sunday we had two different issues, the first one was in the morning when we did the fire up and the second one during the race. Unfortunately, it was two times the control unit ECU box and it’s something that we never experienced in the past. I hope now it’s under control now that we have a deeper analysis on these.” – the Ferrari boss concluded, ahead of the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.
