Leclerc takes issue with Sainz defying team orders

Charles Leclerc was clearly unhappy with an incident in qualifying for the British Grand Prix on Saturday, in which team mate Carlos Sainz appeared to defy instructions from the Ferrari pit wall.

Sainz was at risk of missing the cut at the end of Q1 and was determined to get out and set his final flying lap time before there were any more incidents or rain to prevent him.

He lined up ahead of Leclerc on pit lane for the restart fallowing a brief red flag interruption for Kevin Magnussen's breakdown, but team protocol was that Leclerc should have been in front.

"In the pit-lane, it's something that we were expecting as we're always trying to get the cars out at the same time and it's better to manage," Leclerc told the media in the paddock at Silverstone after the session.

"We have one race where I have the priority to choose whether I want to be in front or behind, and one race Carlos has the priority to choose whether he wants to be in front or behind," he explained.

"I had the choice here and I decided to be in front, then at the end we were very tight on timing and I think it was very difficult for us to know whether we were going to get past or not before the flag."

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The team gave a clear instruction to Sainz to allow Leclerc past, which he did. But Sainz - fearing a drop in tyre temperatures could wreck his chances of making the cut - subsequently overtook his team mate on the track.

At the time, Sainz had questioned the team order for him to let Leclerc past, pointing out that he was at greater risk of missing the cut.

"It's a bit unfair what you're asking me to do there," he complained to the Ferrari pit wall. "Sacrifice my tyre temperature. But anyway, whatever. Also, I am P4, he is P3, I am more at risk."

When he subsequently passed Leclerc again he denied he'd been annoyed by the original request. "I'm not upset," Sainz insisted. "It was a high pressure moment in getting out of Q1 because of the chequered flag.

"We were waiting in the last corner, and at some point I had to go to get a lap in, but [Charles] had priority this weekend," he said. "I had to go a lap in. If not, I wouldn't have put a lap in."

Sainz said the real blame was the way that cars around them hadn't respected the "gentleman's agreement" not to pass cars ahead of them on the track as they prepared to make qualifying runs.

"The problem is people behind started to overtake us. It meant if you give a 4s gap between all the cars, I wasn't going to get a lap in - because a gentlemen's agreement doesn't exist anymore, and it's been completely forgotten."

Leclerc responded to being passed with a caustic "Nice Carlos, nice, good overtake in the last corner," which he admitted sounded more hostile than he had intended it.

"Obviously with the adrenaline inside the car, you don't know at that point if you're going to make it and the radio message was probably a bit more aggressive than it should have been.

"It is not ideal. We will discuss about it, it had no influence, so no big deal," he added. Leclerc and Sainz both made it through at the end of Q1 - Leclerc was second quickest, while Sainz was 12th - and went on to qualify in P4 and P5.respectively.

"I didn’t put the perfect lap together in Q3 as I lost grip in turn 15, so a front row position was not possible today," Leclerc said.

"We don’t have any race trim data on my side because I missed out on FP2, but we maximised every session since then and are in a decent starting position, so everything is possible tomorrow."

"We can expect a nice battle with the cars around us so I expect an intense race. We’ll give absolutely everything to bring home a good result," added Sainz.

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