The signs that show Leclerc really was set to beat Red Bull in Vegas

“I really believe that… the win was ours.”

Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, sitting alongside winner Max Verstappen in the post-race press conference for Formula 1’s returning event in Las Vegas, was clearly buzzing from the adrenaline surges of battling the Red Bull cars in a genuine multi-car win fight for the first time in forever.

But under the surface, he knew something much better had slipped through his fingers. However, was this really another Ferrari win lost?

The 2023 Las Vegas Grand Prix ultimately swung on a series of race neutralisation calls. The last was the single biggest element in yet another swashbuckling, wild, thrilling Leclerc defeat.

Ever since Carlos Sainz had secured pole for the Italian race and battled Verstappen so brilliantly at Monza, it was obvious Vegas would present Ferrari with another opportunity for victory. The 3.9-mile track with its 1.4-mile blast along Las Vegas Boulevard – The Strip – was perfect for the Scuderia to deploy its ‘Monza special’ flatter rear wing package.

The cold temperatures here, while far from as freezing as feared, still had the paddock’s personnel clad in coats and jackets all weekend. And in such conditions, Ferrari’s in-race tyre overheating and degradation problem vanishes.

“This says a lot about our car,” Leclerc would later reflect.

In fact, with the few corners on this new layout slow, technical in places and requiring the kind of kerb-riding the SF-23 likes and Leclerc seems to love, allied with the RB19 hating such track elements, Ferrari’s position got stronger still. The Red Bull also lacked the corner types that helps it switch on the front tyres well elsewhere, forcing it to avoid super-low downforce rear wings to find that energy where it could – at Monza and here too in Vegas.

The low-grip track, with its slippery, bitumen-retaining surface played a part too. That exacerbates rear tyre sliding and the cool temperatures also made tyre graining a major factor. So too did the street track setting and otherwise open public roads, plus no support series running, meaning the track evolution factor reset each night.

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

Leclerc was adamant the win slipped away from him in Vegas, but how does his claim stack up?

Leclerc also understands well the importance of careful throttle application running out of slow corners and onto the straights. The balance required is getting good momentum to hit the top speeds fastest but also not stress the tyres and worsen rear tyre graining. It’s a key reason why he’s so good in Baku, one of the tracks this venue can be compared to (along with Monaco for its low-grip surface and Jeddah for high-speed, blind corners).

And Ferrari’s position, maybe even as the favourite on a combination of pure speed and long-run pace, was further cemented by Sainz securing second ahead of Verstappen in qualifying. The red machines would have locked out the front row but for the cement around that water valve cover failing on Thursday night.

Then something rather unexpected happened ahead of the race. This was the classic convertible supposed to carry McLaren’s Oscar Piastri on the drivers’ parade leaving a long streak of oil – soon covered with cement dust and removed as much as possible – right along where Verstappen would start.

“Not ideal,” Verstappen said of this, with a bat straight as ever. “I had to steer a bit left of it at the start.”

As he did so, Verstappen was already gaining on polesitter Leclerc, whose position was made worse by a sudden wheelspin moment in the second phase post-launch. They were near level when they hit the brakes for the Turn 1 left-hand hairpin, where the race’s most controversial moment occurred.

There had been quite the melee in the pack behind the leaders – all caused by the low-grip surface and not helped by the oil situation. Fernando Alonso’s solo spin had him tagged by Valtteri Bottas, who in turn was hit by Perez behind

Verstappen was always going to make a move. Leclerc “gave a bit of margin because I had more to lose and especially with the constructors’ championship fight we [Ferrari] have with Mercedes”. Plus, Verstappen’s already-secured title success meant he could afford to risk retiring.

The Red Bull was a long way alongside at Turn 1’s apex, but critically wasn’t ahead, despite what Verstappen and his squad would later claim over the airwaves after both had gone off and Verstappen emerged ahead.

“I braked and there was no grip,” he explained post-race. “I didn't mean to push Charles off the track, but I couldn't slow it down.”

Verstappen, however, clearly might have applied more steering lock in a manoeuvre the stewards said involved him “appearing to miss the apex of Turn 1” and not “following the racing line”.

Photo by: Lubomir Asenov / Motorsport Images

Verstappen pushed Leclerc off track and copped a five-second penalty

He was later handed a five-second penalty that he said afterwards was “probably the right call”. In the car, when informed of the stewards’ decision “full of adrenaline” and “not happy with the decision”, Verstappen glibly asked Red Bull to “give them my regards”.

By this point he was 2.2s clear, having scampered to a 1.7s lead by the end of lap one of 50, then again dashed off after the virtual safety car had been activated just before the end of the first tour to allow debris at Turn 1 to be cleared.

There had been quite the melee in the pack behind the leaders – all caused by the low-grip surface and not helped by the oil situation. Fernando Alonso’s solo spin had him tagged by Valtteri Bottas, who in turn was hit by Perez behind.

Red Bull therefore pitted Perez under the VSC to change his nose and switch him from the medium tyres the two leaders had also started on to the hards. This would become critical soon enough, with the Mexican rejoining down in 18th, but able to recatch the pack thanks to what happened next.

This was the real variety of safety car being called out because, soon after racing resumed at lap two’s end, Lando Norris crashed very hard at Turn 11 on the next tour.

The McLaren driver had been following team-mate Piastri through the fast, flowing right/left sequence at this point and was caught on a bump – his car snapped right.

Cold, gripless tyres and low pressures from the lower speeds under the VSC neutralisation were also a factor in the crash that only ended when Norris hit the barriers in the run-off far behind Turn 13, having come dangerously close to wiping out Piastri too.

The race resumed on lap seven, and Verstappen set about establishing that 2.2s advantage. Red Bull clearly expected him to be able to extend that and negate his penalty quickly. But that was actually as good as it got.

The leaders were lapping in the 1m38s, with Leclerc able to first peg Verstappen’s escape, then chip away at it and reverse any subsequent gains. Eventually, on lap 15, Verstappen’s pace fell to the mid-1m39s and, suddenly, there was a real victory race happening.

Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images

Verstappen pitted first as Leclerc roared into the lead having got more out of the medium tyres

The Dutchman’s tyres were “f*****” – suffering from his two stints abusing the mediums in trying to break the tow to Leclerc after the virtual and real safety cars. The yellow-walled compound had been vulnerable to graining all through the weekend, although for Red Bull this was surprisingly worse compared to FP2 when it held an advantage over Ferrari.

And so, on lap 16, just as Leclerc was getting DRS for the long blast along the Strip – the zone lengthened by 50 metres after Thursday/Friday night practice to improve the overtaking potential – Red Bull called Verstappen in.

By the time he pitted, Verstappen was second on the road again – Leclerc having retaken the lead at Turn 14 and the corner leading off the Strip by the Planet Hollywood complex, where apparently ticketless fans would later tear down track view-blocking screens. Now Ferrari could use its “better tyre management” on the mediums, per team boss Fred Vasseur.

It left Leclerc out for five more laps, gaining a significant tyre life offset to his rival, who had rejoined 11th and behind even George Russell. The Mercedes, which had briefly been able to stay with the leaders running third early on before falling back along with Alpine’s qualifying star, Pierre Gasly, had come in on lap 15 and (like Verstappen) taken hards.

Ferrari, despite easily having time to pull Leclerc in, left him out. This was “the timing of the safety car [being] the worst-case scenario for us” per Vasseur

Leclerc got these on the 21st tour, which boosted Perez to the net lead. He’d battled by Lance Stroll, Daniel Ricciardo and Zhou Guanyu after the safety car restart, with strong pace in the low 1m38s in free air once the leaders had pitted.

The RB19, per team boss Christian Horner, just “came alive” on what Verstappen called “a bit more robust” product “against the graining” in the white-walled compound. But Perez still faced a 49-lap stint to the end if nothing else happened to create another cheap pitstop.

Leclerc’s early tours on the hards were not setting the timing screens alight. But this was because he was working “to bring them into temperature and we had done a really good job on that”.

This is why Leclerc ended up feeling “really confident that the win was ours” at this stage.

The hard needed such careful treatment because “you had to push harder to generate the heat into the tyre”, according to Pirelli motorsport boss Mario Isola. But overdoing it would risk the rear-tyre graining everyone was fearing and was worse all weekend on the mediums.

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

After pitting, Leclerc had Perez ahead of him but had a major fresh tyre advantage

Verstappen, meanwhile, was racing hard against Zhou and Alonso, recovering to run with Russell on lap 23. At this stage Leclerc had finally started pressing on to the low 1m38s and on lap 25 he passed VSC-stopper Stroll, then faced an 11.4s gap to Perez.

Verstappen’s lap 20 pass on Zhou had shown a hint of what the RB19 could do through the long Turns 10-11 swoops that most other cars could not. This was to be so quick that Turn 12 then became a legitimate overtaking spot, with the long Strip DRS run still to come.

On lap 25, Verstappen’s run to here was again so good he moved to attack Russell into Turn 12. But the Mercedes driver “totally didn't see him in the blindspot” and turned in – hard. The contact smashed Verstappen’s font wing right-side endplate, but did little real damage to Russell’s W14 bar breaking its left-front wheel cover. But it again left debris strewn across the track.

Russell would later be handed a 5s penalty for causing the crash. The Briton would go on to battle by others that didn’t stop under the second safety car over the rest of the race, ultimately recovering to finish fourth on the road but dropping to eighth when his penalty was applied.

But there was much still to come first, starting with Red Bull pulling Perez and Verstappen in to bank more gifted race time. For Perez, this likely meant he avoided having Leclerc “coming back” with his strong hard-tyre pace, as Vasseur put it. Horner refused to say whether Perez would have needed a second stop, saying only “it was a voyage into the unknown, just keep going until you need to stop”.

Ferrari, despite easily having time to pull Leclerc in, left him out. This was “the timing of the safety car [being] the worst-case scenario for us” per Vasseur.

So, the order when the safety car peeled in for the start of lap 29 was Leclerc, Perez, Piastri, Gasly and Verstappen – the McLaren and Alpine also boosted forwards by not taking the option of stopping under the second safety car.

Leclerc did well to drop Perez by hitting the gas out of Turn 14, where he’d earlier been annoyed that Verstappen had led the first restart from before that corner and so braked hard again. This gave Leclerc a handy 0.8s advantage, which was 1.5s by Turn 5. But this wasn’t the DRS-proof advantage it seemed because of the hard’s warm-up challenge.

“The problem is that then when you cool them down during the safety car, to restart a used tyre is incredibly difficult and there we lost the race,” Leclerc explained. “I think we did the best job we could restarting the hard. I slid quite a bit and that's not great.”

Photo by: Glenn Dunbar / Motorsport Images

Leclerc had track position from the second safety car but lost his tyre advantage as Red Bull pitted both its drivers for a cheap stop

Isola explained that the hard tyre challenge here was that, without a fresh set, “you struggle to put the energy into the tyre to generate the heat because you have less rubber”. Plus, the length of the Strip straight and cool conditions meant the front tyres were losing up to 40C and the rears 25C, even at full racing speeds.

All this meant Perez, with hards five laps younger, was in DRS range as soon as it was reactivated on the 31st tour. Here Leclerc was able to stay ahead using his very low-downforce wing package, with Perez still on the bigger of the two Red Bull tried in practice.

But the next time by, Perez seized the lead with a DRS run to Turn 14 that ended with him getting it done on the brakes on the inside line.

But Leclerc didn’t give up. He stuck with Perez so well he was able to use his top speed prowess (he topped the race speed trap at 217mph) to repass at the same point three laps later. But by this time Verstappen had dispatched Gasly and Piastri and was again a victory contender just behind.

Even on the day Perez finally sealed second in the 2023 drivers’ standings, he couldn’t give Red Bull a 1-2. This was because, while Verstappen moved clear to a lead of 4.5s by the end of lap 47, Leclerc had by then erased the 1.5s deficit he faced after his off

He asked Red Bull to consider they “work together”, then passed his team-mate anyway – at Turn 14 on lap 36. The next time by, he got Leclerc at the same spot. The Ferrari driver came off the brakes to try and make a fight of it at the apex, but Verstappen was in the right spot to negate this.

Engineer Gianpiero Lambiase urged Verstappen to push to break the tow with Leclerc still lurking and getting DRS to aid his defence against Perez in turn, which the restored leader did with a pace increase to the 1m35s that Leclerc couldn’t do until near the finish.

Then, on lap 43 with Verstappen 1.9s ahead, Leclerc locked up at Turn 12 and went deep, which handed Perez second.

But even on the day Perez finally sealed second in the 2023 drivers’ standings, he couldn’t give Red Bull a 1-2. This was because, while Verstappen moved clear to a lead of 4.5s by the end of lap 47, Leclerc had by then erased the 1.5s deficit he faced after his off.

Red Bull was sufficiently concerned about his close presence to Perez that it asked Verstappen to back off to a 2.5s gap to second to aid Perez with a long-range tow. Verstappen obliged, but it made little difference.

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

After a lock-up that allowed Perez into second, Leclerc came charging back at the Mexican

This was because Leclerc had spotted Perez making “a small mistake [a left-front lock-up at Turn 14 on lap 44] four or five laps before [the last lap], so I knew he was being cautious a little bit on braking”. Having charged his electrical energy for one last effort, which turned out to be his personal best lap time on the final tour, Leclerc went for it at Turn 14.

He made a late lunge to the inside and Perez turned out of a harder fight. Leclerc then covered off any hint of an audacious last-corner repass by sticking to the inside and hanging on to beat Perez by just 0.2s, Verstappen having already taken the chequered flag 2.1s ahead.

There can be little doubt that Leclerc had been denied a genuine victory shot by the final safety car. As Isola noted “it was working quite well”, the hard was the tyre to race on longest. It had some graining, but this was “not affecting the performance”, again per the Italian, especially compared to the medium. Perez’s misfortune on lap one put him on that rubber effectively from the off and, while he did make several fine passes in the pack, the race circumstances did the rest.

Verstappen was also able to press into the 1m36s and quicker on the hards soon after the final restart. That’s even with his damaged front wing, of which Horner noted: “Thankfully it wasn’t a massive [balance] shift.”

But, critically, Verstappen had also switched to what he called Red Bull’s closest version of a “fantastic low downforce wing” ahead of qualifying, which he felt took “a little bit of time to get into a nicer rhythm” with, something that hurt his performance on Friday night. In the race, it made him “quick on the straight” compared to Perez but it was also then “a little bit more loose in the corners”.

This exacerbated his mediums graining when leading early, but on the hards this was less of a problem because they were more durable and so Verstappen “could really push on the tyres” at a low-degradation venue.

That clearly boosted Ferrari, which was left to reflect on so many cases of what might have been.

Leclerc explained in the press conference that “now, [with hindsight’s benefit] I would have stopped” under the second safety car. Had he done so he would have sacrificed track position to Perez, but clearly would have been able to pass in a straight fight given he got the Red Bull that at that stage had the best chance to win in any case.

The safety car aided Verstappen in that Isola reckoned making the finish on his first set of hards would have meant “he would have suffered more tyre degradation”. This increases the case Perez was on a two-stopper before Russell hit Verstappen, given his first hards were already 25-laps old.

Leclerc never really got to show what he could do in clean air on the hard tyres he’d worked so well to bring in.

Photo by: Sam Bagnall / Motorsport Images

In a city where lady luck is a familiar face, Leclerc will feel she wasn't on his side in the Las Vegas GP