Why Charles Leclerc had issues managing the Intermediate tyre after the stop

Scuderia Ferrari Monegasque driver Charles Leclerc tried a bold move in the 2021 Turkish Grand Prix and attempted to finish the Istanbul race without changing the tyres, but eventually it became cleare that it was not the ideal strategy for the final stages of the race. Charles was then called in for a fresh set of Intermediates with 11 laps until the end of the Turkish Grand Prix and returned to the track in third place, but Red Bull’s Sergio Perez was able to easily catch and overtake him: having to defending from the Red Bull driver meant that Charles pushed his tyres right immediately after exiting the pits, as opposed to switching them on gradually, which would have contained the graining.

The early pushing on the new set, on a circut which was a lot more dry than the start of the Grand Prix, led to massive graining on the rear tyres of the SF21 car, and then on the fronts, similar to what happened to Lewis Hamilton after his late pit stop. Due to this, the pace of Charles’ SF21 car was very poor for a few laps, most precise a total of three laps. It was only in the very last few laps of the Turkish Grand Prix, when Charles Leclerc was able to manage to warm up the core of the tyre, that the graining cleared and the performance slowly returned. But by then, it was too late: Charles recovered almost three seconds to Sergio Perez, but not enough to regain his position on the podium.

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Charles Leclerc’s performance was still superlative, especially if we take into consideration the fact that the Monegasque driver race with a dry setup (less downforce), as Scuderia Ferrari anticipated a race in dry condtions. This was far from ideal given the actual race conditions encountered on Sunday in Turkey.

The weight of the fuel, coupled with the high levels of grip offered by the tarmac and the Low Range of Intermediate compound, helped the SF21 putting the right amount of stress on the tyres despite the low downforce setup.

On the other hand, Carlos Carlos had the perfect setup for the conditions and had to deal with less problems regarding graining. Carlos handled the warm-up phase of his Intermediate compounds better once he ran in clean air: due to his slow pit stop, the Spanish driver returned to the track behind the Alpine of Esteban Ocon and lost some time at this stage, but Carlos Sainz after overtaking the Alipine car, he was able to bring his tyres in their optimal operational window for the final part of the race, showing very strong pace. Unfortunately not enough to catch the McLaren of Lando Norris.