Charles Leclerc, Ferrari Formula 1 driver, believes his team has “best shot” against title contending team Red Bull.
The Italian team showed impressive pace on the opening practice day of Australian GP. Leclerc is very confident of his new F1 car, SF-24, which he feels is in great shape in terms of performance.
Despite his car in good shape, he conceded that the Red Bull team dominate the arena. But he feels the Ferrari could do better in the succeeding races of the campaign.
“I will say that we are in a better position than the first two races,” said Leclerc.
“However Red Bull weren’t pushing yet, so we’ve got to wait and see where their potential is at.
“I think they are still ahead, but we might have our best shot this weekend since the beginning of the season.”
Leclerc claims Ferrari great start in Melbourne and the team would its best to extract maximum out of the car. He remains positive to exploit the car’s performance over the weekend.
“It feels good for now,” he said. “We’ve had a positive day from the first laps in FP1 to the end of FP2, so that’s a good start.
“However, we need to keep working very hard because I’m sure that we’ll see some surprises.
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“There’s no reason for us to be a bit in front compared to everyone else tomorrow as well, so there is still margin to improve in some things. But our race run was pretty good, which is encouraging, but let’s see.”
Carlos Sainz, Ferrari second driver, joined the Australian Grand Prix after missing the KSA event due to appendicitis operation.
Despite health issues, he still managed to take the third place in FP2. His team-mate Leclerc remained ahead of him with a gap of 0.43 seconds.
Sainz shared his feeling after the operation and said: “Good, thank you. I feel okay.
“Obviously I feel tired after practice, not being 100% physically, but I felt like I had a good day. And if you would have told me a week ago that I could do the whole practice without issues then I would have been very happy. So, I’m very happy for that.
“Obviously, I need a good night’s sleep and good recovery for tomorrow. But yeah, I feel good.”
