'Scared' Leclerc admits: 'I definitely needed that one!'

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Having won two out of the first three races of 2022, Charles Leclerc was finally back on top of the podium for the first time since Australia in April to claim his third win of the season in the Austrian Grand prix in Spielberg.

For the first time in months, the Ferrari looked genuinely faster than Max Verstappen's Red Bull. Starting from second behind the pole sitter, Leclerc was able to pass his rival in a straight shoot-out on track on multiple occasions.

But Leclerc's day almost came undone when he suffered a sticking throttle that made the F1-75 difficult to drive, especially as it happened just moments after his team mate Carlos Sainz has suffered a spectacular power unit blow-up.

Read also: Leclerc too fast for Verstappen as Sainz blows up in Austria

"At the end it was incredibly difficult," admitted in the post-race media interview in parc ferme. "I had this problem with the throttle, and it would get stuck at 20 or 30 per cent throttle in the low speed.

"Weirdly it was more or less at the same time [as Sainz], so of course I had it in my mind.

"I knew it was not a problem with the engine because it was really the pedal that was feeling weird," he added. "First at pick up and then at the end it would not come back to zero, but luckily it went until the end of the race.

Over the team radio after the chequered flag, Leclerc said that "I was scared, I was really scared!" But while Verstappen closed the gap to the leader he wasn't able to get close enough before the finish.

"It was very tricky, but we managed to make it stick until the end - and I'm so, so happy."

"I definitely needed that one," the race winner continued. "The last five races have been incredibly difficult for myself, but also for the team obviously.

"To finally show that we've got the pace in the car and that we can do it is incredible," he added. "It was a really good race, the pace was there at the beginning, and we had some good fights with Max.

Although the result means that Leclerc clips Verstappen's lead in the drivers championship by five points, Leclerc is still a long way behind in the standings.

Both their team mates - Carlos Sainz and Sergio Perez - ended up retiring form the race. It means Leclerc moves ahead of Perez and is now back in second place behind Verstappen, railing by 38 points after 11 of 22 races.

But the Monegasque said that today's race it showed the title battle was far from over. "We need to push until the end!"

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.