The 2018 Vettel rut Leclerc must avoid in F1 2022's title fight

The qualifying king, an ability to nail consummate victories, battle wheel-to-wheel and pass your key title rival, but occasionally cracking under the pressure that comes with Ferrari not having won a championship since 2008. This season’s Charles Leclerc, meet early 2018-spec Sebastian Vettel.

The eerily similar first half of these two campaigns is striking, and now both might come to be remembered for a critical crash. Leclerc’s smoky spin into the Beausset barriers last weekend in the French Grand Prix could become just as symbolic of a lost drivers’ crown as Vettel skating across the gravel and into the wall at Hockenheim three years and 363 days previously.

PLUS: The knife-edge French GP Verstappen fight factors that led to Leclerc's costly crash

In a treacherous German GP, four-time champion Vettel was told to stay out on slicks as those who’d pitted for wets had “destroyed” their tyres. The driver duly agreed before running wide out of the final corner to shed the entire left-hand cascade from the front wing of his SF71H machine. Quite how much this robbed Vettel of grip is hard to determine since the arrival of more rain meant conditions were changing all the while.

Nevertheless, a couple of lock-ups and moments where he struggled to stop the car should have given fair warning. Only then, at the end of lap 52 of 67, he infamously slid over the kitty litter at Sachs Curve and into retirement, a nine-second lead over Valtteri Bottas blown. The car was a little wounded prior to the impact, but this was almost wholly a driver error.

Exactly like Leclerc. He ran wide on lap 17 of 53 at Paul Ricard to clip a white line and pitch his car into the spin that would soon enough eliminate him from a race he’d been leading by 10s over Lewis Hamilton as, then running in sixth, Max Verstappen was attempting a powerful uncut for a seemingly inevitable race win showdown. In both cases, a small lapse had major Sunday afternoon consequences.

Out of the nature of the shunt, the context of the season, a general susceptibility for mistakes, it’s the immediate and secondary reactions of Vettel and Leclerc where they’re furthest apart. Vettel was quiet, almost teary as he radioed: “Fuck’s sake… sorry guys… Scheisse.” Already iconic is Leclerc’s absolute rage at himself. The panting followed by the anguished scream of: “Nooo!”.

That was in the moment, but how they fronted up to the media after also separates the duo. Leclerc owned his blunder and was brutally introspective, saying: “It’s extremely frustrating. I feel like I’m performing at probably the highest level of my career since the beginning of the season, but there’s no point performing at that high level if I am doing those mistakes.

Leclerc's error handed victory to Verstappen and extended his rival's lead in the standings

Photo by: Carl Bingham / Motorsport Images

“I think there are 32 points overall [I’ve lost with mistakes], 25 today - I think it was likely we were going to win today because we were fast. And seven in Imola with my mistake. So, at the end of the year we will count back, and if there are 32 points missing then I know it’s coming from me, and I did not deserve the championship. But for the second half of the championship, I need to get on top of those things if I want to be a world champion.”

Vettel was much less self-critical, at least publicly, as he downplayed his 2018 wreck.

"I was just a tiny bit too late [on the brakes], locked the rears and I couldn't turn it,” was his assessment. "It was nothing spectacular, really. It feels better if it's spectacular because then you've done something really wrong. In this case I didn't really do much wrong, but enough to finish (end) the race. It wasn't the biggest mistake I've done, but it was probably one of the most costly."

As his qualifying shunts in Azerbaijan in 2019 and last season’s Monaco pole shootout prove, Leclerc hasn’t eliminated unforced and expensive errors

Perhaps it’ll be the greater levels of self-criticism that will in some part prevent the rest of Leclerc’s campaign from mimicking the relatively poor run of form that Vettel soon became bogged down in. Having led Hamilton by eight points heading into the German GP, a race the Brit then won from 14th after his qualifying gearbox failure, Vettel made too many errors to make heavy weather of a championship battle that should have been closer.

He failed to win again after Spa, as mistakes came with increasing frequency - even if the 25 points lost at Hockenheim was the single most costly incident. Vettel collided and spun while battling Hamilton at Monza, ditto for Verstappen at Suzuka and then again with Daniel Ricciardo at Austin. This came after hitting Bottas in France and locking up while trying to take the lead in Baku.

Even if Ferrari ended up removing four months’ worth of upgrades (concerning the floor most of all) that had ravaged the car’s pace, and there were strategy errors in qualifying for the Italian and Belgian GPs, it was driver more than team that went off the boil. The death of Ferrari boss Sergio Marchionne in July is also considered.

But the title fight was by no means over after Germany. Vettel trailed Hamilton by 17 points heading into the Hungarian GP, the final race before the summer break. But the current Aston Martin driver would ultimately cede a fifth coronation by 88 points as he continued to drop the ball. Mistakes for Hamilton, meanwhile, proved particularly elusive. A lock-up in Azerbaijan that forced a strategy compromise is noted, but the Brit won the round regardless.

After his Hockenheim crash, Vettel made several errors at critical points in 2018 - such as spinning after clashing with Ricciardo at CoTA

Photo by: Jerry Andre / Motorsport Images

This time around, Leclerc is now 63 points in arrears of the championship leader - with Verstappen dropping the RB18 in a gust at Turn 4 at Barcelona his biggest blunder so far - heading into the last race before the one-month respite. While Leclerc shipped seven points spinning in pursuit of Sergio Perez at Imola, his season has otherwise been remarkable - headlined by his three passes on Verstappen to win in Austria, plus managing the sticking throttle damper.

PLUS: The elements of Leclerc’s Austria win that bode well for his F1 future 

But as his qualifying shunts in Azerbaijan in 2019 and last season’s Monaco pole shootout prove, Leclerc hasn’t eliminated unforced and expensive errors. While this term it can be argued that he is unproven in an F1 title fight (very much unlike Vettel in 2018) and so might be feeling the strain even more, he is no longer an inexperienced F1 driver to allow that excuse to wholly pass muster. Repeating the mistakes of the past also means further stumbles and crashes cannot be ruled out for the rest of the campaign.

To a much greater extent than Vettel faced in 2018, it has been Ferrari unreliability and the Scuderia’s dropping of the strategic ball that has limited Leclerc’s opportunities to convert his one-lap supremacy into the spoils. As such, it has allowed a borderline chasm to open up in the championship fight. But the Monegasque’s Paul Ricard shunt ensured he missed a critical opportunity to convert a chance that did present itself, and one he absolutely needed to seize.

Leclerc's big bout of self-deprecation might be the best way for him to process what has happened and to therefore avoid committing a similar error for the rest of the season in a way that Vettel didn’t manage. That could offer some glimmer that a proper title fight can still be achieved in the remainder of 2022, something that didn't happen four years ago.

Leclerc can afford no more stumbles to redeem his title hopes

Photo by: Carl Bingham / Motorsport Images