16 May 22, 2022The Sunday TimesSport Spanish Grand Prix
T
here were surely no tears
shed in the Red Bull garage
when Ferrari’s Charles
Leclerc spun off at the penul-
timate corner of his flying lap
round the Circuit de Catalu-
nya. There were only a few
minutes left in the final quali-
fying session for the Spanish Grand
Prix and Leclerc’s mishap appeared to
have handed pole position to their
man, Max Verstappen.
But Leclerc had just enough time to
get back to the pits, get a new set of
tyres on his otherwise undamaged
car, and get back out for one last shot.
Off he roared, and with a stunning
combination of blistering pace and
ice-cold nerves the man from Monaco
carved out a lap that bettered his Red
Bull rival’s effort. Nor could Verstap-
pen fight back, as DRS issues had
robbed his car of speed.
In fairness, the Red Bull response
was magnanimous. “I don’t think we
had enough today to beat that lap of
Charles,” said their team principal
Christian Horner. “That was a great
lap by him under pressure at the end.”
Perhaps there was also an element
of quiet confidence in the Red Bull
reaction. Scorching heat and an abra-
sive track take their toll on tyres at this
venue, and Leclerc admitted his con-
cern that Red Bull can handle tyre
degradation better than his team. On
the plus side, 23 of the 31 grands prix
staged here have been won by the
pole-sitter, and it would no doubt suit
Leclerc if his Ferrari team-mate, Car-
los Sainz, third on the grid, could get
into a decent tussle with Verstappen.
“Obviously there was a bit more
pressure because you’ve only got one
chance,” Leclerc said of his late
charge. “But the car was amazing. It
was quite tricky at high speed but it
was very good through the medium
and low-speed corners. I was very
happy with that lap and working with
the only chance I had.”
As impressive as anything Leclercdid was George Russell’s feat of
clinching fourth place on the grid for
Mercedes. Russell qualified second at
the 2020 Sakhir Grand Prix when
standing in for Lewis Hamilton, who
had Covid, but this was his best
performance since his move to
Mercedes became permanent at the
start of this season.
It was also the third time this year
that he has out-qualified Hamilton,
who came in sixth. Not that Russell
was making anything of that advan-
tage. “I just focus on myself and try to
do the best job possible and where
that leaves me,” he said. “I’ll sort of
review from there.
“But obviously I believe in myself,ICE-COLD
LECLERC
ON POLE
It was a good day for Leclerc, above,
while Hamilton and Russell were
cheered on by Roger Federer, belowChampionship leader
pips Verstappen with
fastest lap at the death
as Russell outperforms
Hamilton once more
we know the direction we need to go,”
Russell said. “It’s taken time to firstly
find what the issue is, and then to
develop the tools to be able to solve it.
And then bring things to the car to
actually make it go quicker.
“I think we’ve done that, to a
degree, and now we know the direc-
tion we can focus on making the car
quicker rather than problem-solving.”
Hamilton backed up Russell, say-
ing: “I’m 100 per cent confident in the
team. We’ve now made this step and
that’s something we’ve not seen in the
other five races.
“I think we have a better idea of the
direction we need to go and now we
are just waiting for the engineers andI’ve still got a lot to improve. I don’t
feel like I’m truly optimising the pack-
age and compared to Lewis I’ve defi-
nitely got room to improve in a num-
ber of aspects. But I guess it gives me
excitement to see what I can deliver a
little bit later on in the season.”
Mercedes have had some false
dawns this season, but there is more
confidence throughout the team that
they have finally got a handle on the
porpoising issue that has afflicted
them over the past five races. The
problem of the car bouncing on the
straights still exists, but both drivers
reported that it has been far less seri-
ous this weekend with the package of
upgrades they have added. “I thinkALASDAIR
REIDBarcelona