Charles Leclerc reflects on “strange feeling” with SF-23 right from “the first laps”. Charles on .

A Cold Shower

At the beginning of the 2022 Formula 1 season, Scuderia Ferrari Monegasque driver Charles Leclerc had the illusion of having at his disposal what he called “the beast” at the end of the Australian Grand Prix, referring to the dominating weekend of his Ferrari F1-75, with which he secured pole position, victory, and the fastest lap in the final stages of the race – the third consecutive fastest lap at the start of 2022 after those set in Bahrain and Jeddah in Saudi Arabia.

The triumphant start of the Carles Leclerc-Ferrari combination suffered its first setback at Imola, where Red Bull showed up with a considerably lighter RB18 due to significant weight reduction. Already in the Sprint, the Monegasque had to bow to Max Verstappen, although the Dutchman had lost the lead at the start. Then, in the race, an error at the Variante Alta turned a third-place finish into a sixth-place final position. From that weekend onwards, Charles Leclerc secured only one victory, in Austria.

However, the results achieved at the beginning of the 2022 Formula One championship are “sufficient” to make the podium finishes in 2023 not so satisfying: “They are nice, yes, but I didn’t enjoy them. The memory of 2022 is too fresh. We must not settle for second or third place; Ferrari deserves to win, and we must make it win,” said Charles Leclerc in an interview with Il Corriere della Sera.

Ex team principal Mattia Binotto had stated that the Maranello engine technicians were “well aware” of where to intervene to solve the reliability issues that frustrated Charles Leclerc’s championship dreams in 2022. That’s why there was great confidence among the men in red that they had a great opportunity to complete the work left unfinished in the last season. However, it didn’t turn out that way, and the Monegasque admitted that the feeling of not having a championship-winning car emerged immediately: “In the first laps of testing, there was a strange feeling, something was off in the balance. But only later did I discover that the performance was also lacking.” – the Ferrari man pointed out.