Charles Leclerc explains how “undriveable” Ferrari cost him Hungary F1 win

Charles Leclerc has lamented an issue which may have cost him Ferrari’s only shot at victory in the 2025 Formula 1 season.

Leclerc had narrowly edged out McLaren drivers Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris as well as Mercedes’ George Russell for pole position at the Hungarian Grand Prix; he led 28 of the opening 39 laps of the race at the Hungaroring, only temporarily ceding first place to one-stopping, eventual winner Norris.

However, as he came under pressure from Piastri on lap 40, the Ferrari driver suddenly lost pace – to the point that he lost 37 seconds to the Australian over the last 30 laps of the contest.

“This is so incredibly frustrating,” Leclerc fulminated over team radio. “We have lost all competitiveness. You just had to listen to me. I would have found a different way of managing these issues. Now it’s just undriveable. Undriveable. It will be a miracle if we finish on the podium.”

The Monegasque repeatedly and carefully steered clear of giving any meaningful information about his technical issues on the radio, attempting to preserve the team’s secrets, even as he somewhat lost his temper.

However, speaking after the race, he owned up to misinterpreting the situation and admitted there was no need to berate the Scuderia’s engineers.

“I need to take back the words I said in the radio, because I thought it was coming from one thing, but then I got a lot more detail since I got out of the car,” Leclerc said. “It was actually an issue coming from the chassis, and nothing that we could have done differently.

“I started to feel the issue in lap 40 or something like that, and then it got worse, lap after lap after lap, and towards the end we were two seconds off the pace. And the car was just undriveable.

“It’s an outlier. It shouldn’t ever happen again, but I’m still very disappointed. We had one opportunity this year to win a race, which I think was this weekend.

“The first stint was perfect, the first laps of the second stint were really good as well, and I think we were on pace to try and win that race. The last stint was a disaster when I started to have that issue on the chassis.”

Leclerc went on to explain: “It wasn’t very consistent, but basically every corner it was doing something different.”

Ferrari is yet to win a grand prix in 2025, with its only second-place finish so far coming at Monaco. The fact that Leclerc contended for victory at the Hungaroring – which is the second-slowest track on the calendar after Monte-Carlo – doesn’t give him much hope for the remainder of the campaign against dominant McLaren cars which “even today were very, very fast”.

“What gave me hope of winning is that we were starting first, and with the dirty air it’s a struggle to get past. I think Oscar probably had a bit more pace than me, but couldn’t overtake,” Leclerc added.

“I don’t think we are going into the second half of the season thinking that we can win anywhere, and that’s what makes the frustration even bigger, because we knew that this was one opportunity probably over the season and we had to take it, but unfortunately with this issue we couldn’t do much.”

Charles Leclerc, Ferrari

Photo by: Mark Thompson / Getty Images

Leclerc’s collapse was compounded by a five-second penalty for erratic driving after he moved under braking when defending the final podium position from Russell. The Ferrari racer questioned the penalty but wasn’t outraged either, though he did have a dig at his Mercedes peer’s attitude on the radio.

“I knew I was on the limit, I don’t have much opinion about it,” he said. “I felt like I moved before braking, and then I brake, obviously angling my car towards the apex, which is normally what I do. But I can imagine George being quite vocal on the radio, it’s normally the case.”

Leclerc still scored 12 points that keep him within 21 points of fourth-placed Russell in the championship, with Max Verstappen only 15 points further up the road; meanwhile current runner-up in the constructors’ standings Ferrari has lost four points to its closest challenger, Mercedes, but still has a 24-point buffer.

Photos from Hungarian GP – Race