"We were a little bit unlucky"- Charles Leclerc explains what went wrong for Ferrari after P3 finish at 2022 F1 Dutch GP

In a dramatic 2022 F1 Dutch Grand Prix, Charles Leclerc made it back to the podium for the first time in a while with a P3-finish behind race winner Max Verstappen and Mercedes' George Russell.

In a post-race media interaction, Charles Leclerc claimed that he got a bit unlucky with the virtual safety car that was out after Yuki Tsunoda was forced to retire from the race. He, however, admitted that given Max Verstappen's performance and the pace of George Russell's Mercedes, it was unlikely that the Monegasque would have been able to secure a result better than third in today's race. He said:

“To be honest, much better was difficult to do. We were a little unlucky with the VSC. I don’t know if this would have changed anything – Max was too quick today. Then there was the Mercedes which was flying on the hard tyres. We struggled to find the feeling on the hard tyres, so we’ll analyse that.”

After finishing ahead of Sergio Pérez in the race, Charles Leclerc has put himself back in second in the drivers' standings with 201 points to his name, equal to the Mexican. Max Verstappen, however, has now further extended his lead in the championship and stands a whopping 109 points clear of his two championship rivals of 2022.

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Charles Leclerc looking for a solution to keep "tear-off inside the car"

The 2022 F1 Belgian GP resulted in yet another disappointing day for Charles Leclerc last weekend, after he was forced to pit early after a loose strip from championship leader Max Verstappen's visor came off and got stuck on the brake duct of his Ferrari. He admitted that while he was not angry with the Dutchman, since it was not really in his control, he revealed that he was keen to look for a solution to "keep the tear-off inside the car."

Speaking to Motorsport, Leclerc said:

“I think maybe moving forward, it will be good that we maybe find a solution to keep the tear-off inside the car. In this particular situation, I think somebody was losing oil or something. I could not see anything with my visor and all the drivers in front of me couldn’t see anything in their visors.”

“So it happened that at the first moment of opportunity, we had to take off the tear-off and it was on this straight. So I found myself with tear-offs flying all over the place and in that case, you cannot do much as a driver. I mean, obviously I’m not angry at all with Max, and it is obviously not the fault of the drivers. But we might look at something to find a way to keep the tear-offs somewhere in the car.”

With this, Leclerc was only able to make it up to fifth in the race, given he started from 15th after taking an engine penalty, before being demoted to sixth with a five-second penalty for crossing the pit-lane speed limit.