Where a key Leclerc strength is obscuring the true nature of F1 2022

Motorsport has long been a dreamland for those with a statistics penchant. They’re everywhere, in every category. And right now, in Formula 1 2022, there’s a stat that can offer Charles Leclerc a crumb of comfort after he lost a victory shot through no fault of his own for the third race in succession at last weekend’s Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

It was his least likely chance to prevail over the Red Bull pair after F1 left the tight confines of Barcelona and Monaco to race on Baku’s long blasts. But Leclerc, even before his aggressive virtual safety car stop had set up an intriguing strategy battle that was ruined by his retirement, had already secured an unlikely success on what was expected to be happy hunting ground for the slippery RB18s.

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Leclerc secured his sixth pole of 2022 with a scintillating lap – threading his Ferrari between the walls with assured commitment. Red Bull’s late-Q3 tow plan was scuppered by the delay in refuelling Sergio Perez’s car, but that Leclerc blitzed to the top spot running all by himself anyway was seriously impressive.

That means the 2022 qualifying record sits at Leclerc on six, Perez with one and Max Verstappen also having just a single pole. Leclerc is now the only driver with a perfect 8-0 qualifying record against their team-mate, with Carlos Sainz losing out in the final Baku runs as his risk-taking against the walls backfired.

Now that the first third of the 2022 campaign is complete, trends have been firmly established and the qualifying record to this point is particularly intriguing.

Let’s start with Leclerc and the lessons from his six poles. The Monegasque driver arrived in F1 having produced a run to the joint pole record in GP2/Formula 2 (eight in 2017, shared with Pierre Gasly and Stoffel Vandoorne, but only Leclerc’s came in a single campaign).

But while his searing speed and talent in changeable qualifying conditions was on display in his first F1 season with Sauber the following year, Leclerc’s reputation at the top level started off being one of a driver that couldn’t produce their best when it mattered in Q3.

Leclerc is the only man in the field who has yet to be beaten by a team-mate in qualifying this year

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

He began to fix that the following year with seven 2019 poles for Ferrari – the most of any driver and a record that spurred Lewis Hamilton into upping his qualifying game for what became the final two seasons of the ultra-high downforce F1 era. And now Ferrari is back in title contention, Leclerc is simply stunning Red Bull time-after-time in qualifying.

While his Imola off demonstrates the small but costly errors that littered his game when he arrived in F1 remain, he produced a remarkable turnaround from his early Q3 Spain spin to see off Verstappen there. Arguably, only in Jeddah did Leclerc let a possible pole get away and go to Perez.

And the Mexican’s qualifying record against Verstappen is another important tale of 2022 so far. As good as Perez is, he’s never been regarded as a top qualifier and his record against Verstappen last year was 1:20 (just considering Q1:Q2:Q3 sessions, with Russia discounted as Verstappen didn’t run properly there given his engine change). But this time around their head-to-head stands at 5:3 to the Dutchman, with the average gap between them down from 0.528s in 2021 to 0.271s.

Leclerc’s qualifying excellence alone likely means the 2022 season will remain intriguing – because if he can keep on qualifying ahead then it will at least force Red Bull to make a race of each event

This reflects two things: Perez’s excellent form and preferred handling with the RB18, which is also not giving Verstappen what he wants in terms of a pointy front end. This is particularly a problem on street tracks and it's notable that all three of Verstappen’s qualifying defeats to Perez have come on such courses, with the caveat that he may well have prevailed in Monaco had Q3 there run to a natural conclusion.

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When looking back through F1 history, most poles generally designates the fastest and therefore best car. Not always, such as in recent years that 2019 campaign where Ferrari threw away plenty of advantageous positions (remember this for later) or 2012 – where Hamilton’s fast but fragile McLaren topped the qualifying record.

The 2021 season was a campaign where both Red Bull and Mercedes claimed the other had the faster car. It’s important here to recognise that owning such a narrative suits a team’s competitive needs, particularly in a campaign that got as toxic as that one did. Verstappen ended up with 10 poles to Hamilton’s five, but in the supertimes expression of the best laps of each team for each race, Mercedes came out on top by 0.143%.

This had more to do with Red Bull underperforming on tyre preparation at events such as Turkey and Hamilton’s Brazilian brilliance, but it serves to demonstrate how such things can skew the true picture of an F1 season. And, right now, Leclerc’s 2022 qualifying prowess is doing something similar.

Ferrari's advantage in qualifying hasn't always transferred to race trim in 2022

Photo by: Ferrari

It means Ferrari currently has a supertimes edge of 0.17%, but there’s an argument that the Red Bull is a faster car, it’s just that its best qualifier hasn’t been able to take it to the ultimate edge enough times so far. That argument is weakened because it seems the car is holding Verstappen back, but then adaptability is a key part of a motorsport great’s game.

But there is just no way Ferrari can claim the F1-75 is 2022’s ‘best’ car right now. Once again, Red Bull was on top in the Baku speed strap, although Leclerc’s performance in holding off Verstappen into the first corner during his first stint did suggest the lower-drag rear wing Ferrari introduced but didn’t race in Miami was an improvement in this area.

The Ferrari has also been undone by a tyre wear weakness on softer compounds in hot, dry races such as the Imola sprint and Miami. There is another caveat here, though, as Leclerc’s retirements in Spain and Baku, plus Monaco being wet-to-dry, means there still isn’t evidence to back up the team’s feeling that it has improved in this area – aided by the new floor introduced in Spain.

But the big problem blighting Ferrari right now is reliability. This has gone from being Red Bull’s chief concern to costing Leclerc at least 43 points from the last three races, with Ferrari’s strategy shambles (and Alex Albon’s impeding) in Monaco costing him a possible six more. His team’s reliability dramas are letting Leclerc down right now, but they will also result in additional pain later in the season given he’s already at the limit for new turbo usage.

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Leclerc’s qualifying excellence alone likely means the 2022 season will remain intriguing – because if he can keep on qualifying ahead then it will at least force Red Bull to make a race of each event. But there’s also a significant chance the team with a proven record of improving a package over a season will eliminate the understeer Verstappen doesn’t want.

Plus, with the dirty air effect reduced by the new ground effect cars, a polesitter can no longer rely on the chaser wearing out their tyres more sliding around in the resulting added understeer and random handling instability of the previous eras. Pole is no longer the guarantee it was before, except at a dry Monaco.

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So, Ferrari just need to develop the F1-75 into 2022’s definitive fastest and best car, or even its star’s speed heroics won’t be enough to stop Verstappen’s title defence, which is already being bolstered by Leclerc’s unfortunate unreliability.

Leclerc is making the difference right now, but his qualifying prowess is obscuring the reality of Ferrari's situation

Photo by: Glenn Dunbar / Motorsport Images