Leclerc rues bad luck in Zandvoort but admits race was lost thanks to starting position

Charles Leclerc was only 1.3s away from the podium in Zandvoort, but finished fifth in the final Dutch Grand Prix despite Ferrari demonstrating plenty of race pace on Sunday.

The Monegasque driver had an eventful race, fighting with team mate Lewis Hamilton, McLaren's Oscar Piastri and George Russell’s Mercedes.

Finishing fifth on a day where the pace was strong was frustrating for Leclerc, and he was not helped by a late Virtual Safety Car, called to clear debris caused by the fighting Williams cars. That neutralised racing for a few laps, leaving Hamilton and Leclerc agonisingly short of time to pass Russell.

“Today we just lacked a little bit of luck shall we say. The Virtual Safety Car wasn’t really the best timing for us, if anything it was the worst,” Leclerc explained. "But as I say, sometimes in racing you get lucky, sometimes you get unlucky.

“Before the break I had two or three races where luck seemed to be by my side and at some point you get the other side of the coin and today was an example of that. But the pace I think was strong and eventually I think we are losing today’s race because of the Qualifying yesterday.

“And surely it is never easy when you are starting at the back [of the front runners] at a track like this. So, it was always going to be a difficult race.”

Leclerc qualified third for Saturday's Sprint before finishing second in that race, showing Ferrari did indeed have the pace to mix with Mercedes and McLaren. But as conditions cooled for Qualifying, neither Scuderia driver could extract the same sort of pace.

Instead, Hamilton qualified fifth and Leclerc sixth. Leclerc actually got the better start and was running ahead of his team mate, but Hamilton wound up jumping ahead courtesy of a different tyre strategy.

There were a few terse messages on the radio between the Ferrari drivers and the pit wall, with Hamilton on fresher tyres asking to be let by his team mate – something the team solved by pitting Leclerc. But while that decision at the time seemed to annoy the Monegasque driver, he was still able to find some positives after the race.

"Our pace was strong, and I believed in it until the very end because we weren’t that far off George… We did a good job with tyre management and I enjoyed the overtake on Oscar [Piastri]. Our main limitation was probably our starting position, so we have to review and understand where we can improve our qualifying pace.”

Monza is next up, Ferrari's home race and a venue where Leclerc has previously won, but he is under no illusion how difficult the task will be.

“[Mercedes have] been very strong," he said. "McLaren have brought upgrades that are really working and as I was saying earlier this season, I think it is a championship that will be won by upgrades. And we see that with McLaren. I hope we see that with ourselves once we put the next package of upgrades [on] and we will see how it goes.

"I’m excited for Monza next. I have really great memories which I will never forget from there, and it’s just a really special place for us, where we meet so many of our Tifosi year after year. I hope we can make good memories there again this year."