Carlos Sainz’s crash left teammate Charles Leclerc, a qualifying specialist, with a single lap to nail at the end of the session, only for the Monégasque to find his front tires weren’t up to temperature, costing him grip. He set a time that would have been good enough for seventh behind Haas driver Nico Hülkenberg, but it was deleted for exceeding track limits.
Leclerc was frank in his disappointment post-session, saying Ferrari “threw everything in the bin with the Q3 tire temperature issues.” He thought as high as second place on the grid was within reach.
💬 “We were in a good place. We’ve been competitive also thanks to the good job we’ve done. But I don’t know what happened out of the box temperatures because it went all wrong from that moment onwards.”
It leaves Leclerc and Sainz facing a tough race from the fifth row, stunting Ferrari’s recent momentum, which had made it look like a potential threat to McLaren’s championship ambitions. Ferrari trails McLaren’s lead by 51 points.
