How Leclerc beat Verstappen in Red Bull’s backyard after F1 sprint defeat

Three days in Austria reaffirmed that Ferrari still has plenty to address before it’s on a truly even footing with Red Bull. Team orders indecision and pitstop strategy leave plenty to be desired, while a big question mark continues to loom over reliability.

Those shortcomings ensured the Scuderia didn’t inflict maximum damage on points leader Max Verstappen and his team last weekend. Nevertheless, it has now won two races in a row. And this time, Charles Leclerc triumphed on enemy soil because he executed the race brilliantly in a car that was demonstrably the pick of the litter.

The weaknesses of the RB18 are few and far between. But even after mid-season updates, it remains a comparatively heavy beast – exceeding the 798kg dry car and driver minimum threshold. Those extra kilos make themselves known most of all when the machine is in its leanest trim. Running on fumes in qualifying or at the end of the race ensures the excess fat contributes a greater percentage of the overall kerb weight.

As such, although a scruffy final Q3 flier from Verstappen had been enough for pole on this occasion, his pace in the dying laps of the sprint had notably dipped when the bulk was on show. This also contributed to the fact that his tyres degraded faster than pursuer Leclerc.

These factors gave the Monegasque a genuine shot at the spoils in the full GP – with more laps on offer to close the gap and launch an overtake – so long as he remained within striking distance of the polesitter. That mission, one that admittedly had seemed unlikely heading into the round, was further aided by early Sunday morning rain that washed the track of its rubber and grip to exaggerate tyre wear.

PLUS: Why Ferrari can take it to the wire in Austria despite Verstappen’s sprint dominance

Red Bull team boss Christian Horner said: “The degradation, when you look at the sprint race, we pushed a bit harder at the beginning, paid a little bit at the end. But over the whole stint [we were] identical to that [pace] of Ferrari. The only thing that's changed overnight is the rain, the temperature slightly and the fuel loads.”

If the meteorological intervention sounded a touch familiar, it’s the same asphalt cleaning effect that cost Leclerc the post-shower sprint spoils at Imola in April. Three months later, thanks to the combined effect of weight and weather, Leclerc had the prospect of ceasing a podium drought that stretched back to Miami, concluding a winless streak that set in after the Australian GP in April.

Verstappen nailed the start to lead Leclerc into the first corner, but struggled to escape DRS

Photo by: Bryn Lennon - Formula 1

Verstappen led the field away for a notably rapid formation lap in a bid to offset the cooler conditions by generating tyre temperature. The aim was to avoid a repeat of his fumbled start to the sprint. Leclerc, meanwhile, arrived at his grid box and pulled his gloves tight, like a surgeon ready to enter theatre.

Verstappen’s haste paid off as he launched well to hold a middle line and consolidate the lead on the dash to the opening right-hander, before sweeping unchallenged through Turn 1. Leclerc similarly held position to leave the second row as the action hotbed. George Russell fired off the line most effectively aboard his Mercedes to force Carlos Sainz out wide over the green painted runoff and down to fourth.

However, with Ferrari reverting to its slimline Canada-spec rear wing, the low-end punch of the Italian engine worked with the slippery bodywork to allow Sainz to power through the smoke from the flares and arrive at Turn 3 ahead.

Despite the early stop for Verstappen, and the fact two red cars remained, Ferrari opted not to cover off the surviving Red Bull. Instead, Leclerc and Sainz pounded round on the same run plan before finally switching to hards on lap 26 and 27 respectively

The Silver Arrow, having had to find space in the braking zone, was delayed. That duly brought Sergio Perez into the cloudy orange mix. The Mexican tried to muscle his way around the outside at Turn 4, but his rear-right made contact with the W13’s front-left to pitch the Red Bull into the gravel. Russell would be harshly apportioned blame and dealt a five-second penalty, the stewards perhaps influenced by the briefest of lock ups, but he’d already run over the kerb and could offer no more room from the inside.

Perez would keep the car moving across the kitty litter to rejoin and pit for hard tyres. However, the floor damage was severe enough for him to retire just before one third distance of the 71-lap race to leave Red Bull without a rear gunner or the option to split strategies.

Verstappen would have to fly solo thereafter but started his campaign by extracting a lead of 0.927s over Leclerc at the end of the opening tour. A fine effort no doubt, however he hadn’t broken free of DRS range while he balanced not asking too much of his medium tyres too soon as per the previous day.

Leclerc signalled his intent as early as lap eight. It wasn’t a true lunge, but into the braking zone of Turn 3 he just pulled to the inside line for a recce. He squared off the corner to reapply the power sooner than Verstappen. Two tours later, Leclerc could deploy the DRS out of Turn 1 to reel in the Red Bull and slingshot past at the same corner. Verstappen enjoyed the superior exit, though, to hold onto the lead. Still, the change in momentum was evident.

Leclerc had to do the hard work on track, tracking down and passing Verstappen on the medium before doing so twice later on the hards

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

Again, with the letterbox flap of the slender Ferrari rear wing open, Leclerc could out drag his rival to close into Turn 4. Only, on the outside line, Leclerc locked up the front left to offer Verstappen brief respite. That said, the defending champion knew what was coming. “I cannot hold this [for] long,” he calmly acknowledged over team radio.

Next time around, again a wisp of smoke came from Leclerc as he locked up. But he nailed every braking zone for the duration of the second sector on lap 12 to slot through on the inside into Turn 4. The somewhat unconventional move left Verstappen just to open his steering to provide space for the F1-75 and cleanly cede first place. Leclerc then succeeded where his foe had failed – getting out of DRS range just like that.

With Red Bull down to one car, it had to roll the dice. Following a big front-right lock-up into Turn 4, Verstappen was called to pit for a set of hards at the end of lap 13. Heading into the GP, only Russell and the Aston Martins had dared try a set of the white-walled tyres through practice or qualifying. Red Bull had put its focus on understanding the mediums in practice, Ferrari’s emphasis was on the softs.

The defending champion had to shed his fading C4s and venture into the relative unknown. A slow front-left change resulted in a 3.2s stop. Leclerc remained on track with 2.6s in hand over Sainz as Verstappen had to smartly and rapidly carve his past Mick Schumacher for fifth around the outside of the Turn 2 kink. He then demoted 2021 arch-rival Lewis Hamilton with relative ease by cutting back to get a good exit from Turn 3.

Despite the early stop for Verstappen, and the fact two red cars remained, Ferrari opted not to cover off the surviving Red Bull. Instead, Leclerc and Sainz pounded round on the same run plan before finally switching to hards on lap 26 and 27 respectively, having stretched the mediums twice as far as the Dutch racer.

The Scuderia strategy surrounding the late safety car at Silverstone had raised eyebrows. Seven days later, Leclerc and Sainz mirroring one another did little to lower them.

PLUS: How Ferrari’s Monaco headache became its Silverstone migraine

But Ferrari did at least change the narrative this time by entrusting its drivers to be able to overtake around a treacherous narrow track. Keep in mind that on the massively more wide, open Northamptonshire circuit, it had done everything to keep hold of track position to minimise the risk of tripping over other cars.

Verstappen got back ahead by switching to hards sooner, and again following the second stops, but Leclerc always had an answer for the Red Bull

Photo by: Clive Rose / Getty Images

The Spielberg pitstops had handed the lead back to Verstappen, though his switch to a different compound had done little to improve his pace. On lap 33, therefore, Leclerc closed within DRS range to deliver another cleanly decided move for first place at Turn 3. An early decision to cut back allowed Verstappen to gain DRS for the run to Turn 4 but he opted not to mount a proper retaliation. That confirmed his slip into second place.

Verstappen reckoned the grip was becoming not only bad but downright unpredictable. He would later reveal: “Basically, on any tyre, I was just struggling a lot for pace after a few laps – a lot of deg. It’s something I cannot really explain. I expected it to be tough today, but I didn't expect it to be like this.”

Either way, Red Bull moved away from Pirelli’s suggested one-stop optimum and pitted Verstappen again for another set of hards on lap 36. Ferrari didn’t bat an eye lid at this, holding off Leclerc’s next stop until lap 49. With Sainz arriving in the pitlane the time after that, the Ferraris once more faced the prospect of having to demote Verstappen, who was 2.7s ahead of Leclerc with 21 laps left to play.

A Ferrari 1-2 was in the making to make Red Bull pay as much as possible for losing Perez. Sainz was tucked into Verstappen’s wake and ready to pounce on lap 57 when a white puff of smoke wafted out the rear bodywork

Again, having paid a trip to the Maranello mechanics, Leclerc was soon into a rhythm on the white-walled rubber. On lap 53, he gained DRS on Verstappen, the Ferrari moving to the outside for the run to Turn 3. Leclerc smartly let the Red Bull have the apex before turning sharper to jump on the throttle sooner and nail the exit to power back into the lead for the final time. Just as he had rehearsed in the very first phase of the race.

Leclerc has been brilliant all season, but now he was displaying a level of command that simply hadn’t been on the cards 24 hours earlier. Where had it come from?

“We'd been working quite a lot on my driving yesterday night, and I knew that I had a bit more pace on the medium,” Leclerc explained. “It was a surprise to do that much of a step forward… There were two, three corners where I was struggling – especially Turn 1 and 3 and 10. I've been working on these three overnight. Today was much better.”

Until now, Sainz had been close to matching Leclerc at every point – the duo only separated by that single lap on strategy. A 1-2 was in the making to make Red Bull pay as much as possible for losing Perez. The Spaniard was tucked into Verstappen’s wake and ready to pounce on lap 57 when a white puff of smoke wafted out the rear bodywork. Without warning, the power unit self-immolated spectacularly. “No engine! Engine! No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,” radioed Sainz.

Sainz had appeared set to pass Verstappen too and complete a Ferrari 1-2 before his engine failed

Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

What followed next was unpleasant to watch. Flames licked from the rear of the F1-75 when he parked up on the escape road at Turn 4. But coming to a rest on an incline, every time Sainz took his foot off the brake to hop out the car, it rolled backwards. The marshals were yet to arrive with extinguishers as the fire began to surround the cockpit. At that point, Sainz finally leapt clear. Utterly dejected but fortunately unhurt, the Spaniard sat on the bank to process the abrupt end to his mid-season momentum.

Sainz said: “I didn't want to leave the car completely free, out of control, rolling backwards while jumping out. I was calling the marshals to come and help me to put something on the tyres to stop the car rolling down. But the whole process was a bit slow. At some point, there was so much fire that I had to really get a move on and jump out.”

When team boss Mattia Binotto was asked if it was the same failure that killed Leclerc’s victory chances in Baku, his response was “very likely”.

The virtual safety car was triggered for what would be three minutes, and it asked two questions of Ferrari’s one remaining protagonist. First, would Leclerc’s car – albeit sporting fresher engine components after the Spain and Azerbaijan blow-ups – go the distance?

Second, could Ferrari nail its strategy once more? The answer to both was yes… just about. In the slower conditions, Leclerc was followed into the pits by Verstappen to both take on a final set of mediums and maintain the status quo for the climax.

But then Leclerc began to complain about a throttle pedal issue. It was not fully releasing by an estimated 20-30%. That meant through the tight Turn 3, Leclerc was carrying too much momentum in and was inadvertently too early on the power out. “That’s where you don’t want any more speed in the mid-corner,” said Leclerc, who added that he had the failures of Barcelona and Baku in his mind at this stage.

Having to lift and coast to acclimatise to the problem, “the end was incredibly difficult… tricky to manage not so much in the high speed but mostly in the slow speed. Luckily, it [kept going] until the end of the race.”

Leclerc couldn't relax in the closing stages with throttle problems

Photo by: Ferrari

Ultimately, Leclerc had had the legs on Verstappen sooner than anticipated to take the lead. He didn’t have to patiently bide his time until the RB18’s weight problem was exposed late on as the rebadged Honda engine swallowed more fuel. Instead, the Red Bull’s ballast only added to more critical, day-long tyre struggles. All told, it meant the defending champion didn’t have sufficient pace to make Ferrari and Leclerc pay for the sticking throttle.

“I have to admit I was very nervous,” said Binotto. “I stopped watching the race in the last three laps.” But when he looked up, Leclerc had reached the chequered flag 1.5s clear of Verstappen. Three passes for position and adapting his driving to an ailing car enabled Leclerc to chalk his third win of the campaign and fifth in Formula 1. It also proved that Ferrari has found more pace in the last two races to ensure the championship fight isn’t over quite yet, even if Verstappen only had his standings lead dented by five points and Red Bull’s seven.

New-for-2022, the platform for first place is now not just a step but rather a whole other level above the rest. Ultimately that elevated status was entirely befitting of Leclerc’s inspired Sunday performance

Verstappen recognised the result as a display of effective damage limitation, given he was driving the second-best car that day. Leclerc valued it as a powerful morale boost after feeling “everything was against me” across the five previous races.

What both drivers and third-place finisher Lewis Hamilton (a further 39.7s behind Verstappen to head a Mercedes 3-4) failed to observe, however, was the post-race procedure. Their physios entered parc ferme before the trio had been weighed to breach the instructions. The teams copped a €10,000 fine.

All that was left was for the top three to take to the curiously remodelled podium. New-for-2022, the platform for first place is now not just a step but rather a whole other level above the rest. Ultimately that elevated status was entirely befitting of Leclerc’s inspired Sunday performance, even if the Dutch-dominated crowd had desired the rostrum to be headed by someone else.

Leclerc was a cut above the rest on Sunday, racing on with a hobbled car to reignite his title fight with Verstappen

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images