Ferrari’s updates for the Bahrain GP are in place, and they seem to be working: Charles Leclerc celebrates an unexpected third place in qualifying, confirming small improvements.
In a desert weekend dominated by the McLaren cars—unstoppable, with a brilliantly focused Oscar Piastri on pole—the Scuderia seems to be regaining some lost confidence. The Monegasque driver secures the second row, where he will be joined by Italian Kimi Antonelli.
“Honestly, I didn’t expect to be in third place,” commented the #16 in post-qualifying interviews. “I knew I had a bit of margin on the time in the lap during Q3. I had to be patient in Q1 and Q2, waiting for the track to improve in Q3. It was a bit tricky because at the start of Q3, I had negative feelings with the old tires. Once we fitted the new ones, it went a lot better.” – the Monegasque driver pointed out.
Happy with the third spot, Charles Leclerc was still a bit in disbelief but confirmed that the result is thanks to the work done by Ferrari. He and the team have “explored very extreme setups in the past weekends, and now we’ve found the right direction.” He also hinted: “I believe there’s still more performance to extract.”
Before the weekend, there was still uncertainty about whether to bring the new update package or not. The decision was expected on Thursday, and Fred Vasseur and his team gave the green light.
“The team worked incredibly hard to bring these updates. I don’t think this is the best track to see them shine, but it’s a small gain, not a big one,” Charles Leclerc cautiously specified.
And one more preview for the next race weekend, in Saudi Arabia, which will conclude the triple-header that started in Japan. “We hope that next week, this step will be more noticeable. Considering that we’re third with such a small margin compared to the others, it’s clear that the updates worked,” he concluded.
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