Leclerc admits he had to settle for second after Perez pass

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Charles Leclerc says he had to settle for second place and not push Sergio Perez to retake the lead of the Azerbaijan sprint race on Saturday afternoon in Baku.

The Ferrari driver started on pole position and retained the lead into the first corner, before a safety car was deployed for an accident involving AlphaTauri's Yuki Tsunoda.

While Leclerc successfully managed the restart, once DRS was enabled it was a matter of seconds before Perez was able to pounce and blast his way though into turn 1, with little that Leclerc could do to counter the attack.

"Today there wasn't anything more, so [I'm] happy with second place," Leclerc said afterwards when interviewed in parc ferme.

"I didn't fight too much because I just wanted to try and keep my tyres, I knew this was our weak point.

"I tried to stay within the DRS of him so he could pull me on the straight," Leclerc added. "But that wasn't enough. We were losing a little bit too much towards the end with the degradation."

Read also: Perez picks up sprint race win from Leclerc in Baku

Even so, he was able to retain second place from there until the second place despite a spirited attack from Perez' team mate Max Verstappen running in third place in a damaged Red Bull.

Leclerc will have another chance in tomorrow's Azerbaijan Grand Prix, which he will also start from pole position. But he admitted that he thought the balance of power between Ferrari and Red Bull was unlikely to change overnight.

"We cannot change the car," he said, referring to parc ferme conditions being in effect. "Of course you can work a little bit here and there on a flap maybe.

"But [today's sprint] confirms a little bit what we thought - the Red Bull still has the upper hand in the race," he admitted.

"We'll try to anyway go for the win tomorrow even though the Red Bull seems to be quicker," he continued. "If winning is not possible, then we just need to take the maximum points."

Point are very much on the Monegasque's mind, having finished in the points in just one of the three races so far in 2023 leaving him tenth in the drivers standings.

But Leclerc is feeling much more positive about Ferrari's progress heading into Sunday's Grand Prix.

"We mustn't forget how far we were behind in race pace two races ago, so we've taken a step forward. [But] we're still not where we want to be," he acknowledged.

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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.