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Charles Leclerc has revealed the reason he refused to hand the position back to Lewis Hamilton after the pair’s clash at the Mexican Grand Prix.
The duo’s race was marred by a furious clash at Turn 4 on the first lap at the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez, before Red Bull’s Max Verstappen took advantage to secure victory.
Hamilton could be heard saying, “Got pushed out by my own teammate,” via team radio before Leclerc was handed a five-second time penalty for cutting the track.
The Monegasque admitted he “deserved” the penalty after the race, while Hamilton accused him of “working against” him and costing the team valuable points.
Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur was forced to speak out about the incident and accused both drivers of a “lack of respect” for the brand.
“I’m struggling to swallow it because, honestly, I think it’s a lack of respect, a lack of respect for the brand, a lack of respect for all the people working here and for the efforts we’re putting in,” he said.
“We’ve taken a real step forward in terms of performance, and I think throwing away a win like that is tough.”
Leclerc has since explained why he did not surrender the position to Hamilton, citing Verstappen’s presence as a major reason for the decision.
“I mean, it was definitely an opportunity in Turn 1,” Leclerc said. “There was a gap on the outside, and I had quite a lot of speed around the outside of Turn 1.
“Then there was very little space for Turn 2, which is expected for the win, obviously, and then Lewis and I both tried to brake very late. We both didn’t make the corner; I obviously cut the track, which, eventually, after Turn 5, there was Max in between, which made the situation more confusing.
“And speaking with the team, I didn’t really have a clear feedback, and I think it was just confusing enough to keep the position.”
When asked if he needed more guidance from the team, he added: “I mean, we spoke briefly with the team to try and understand.
“I asked, ‘What shall I do now?’
“And it’s always very tricky.
“Obviously, in that situation, you kind of expect you have to do something, but is it second? Is it third? Is it fourth? Well, fourth probably didn’t make sense, but second or third, and yeah, at the end I kept going.
“Obviously, it’s going to be a bit of a talking point, for sure, next briefing.”
F1 returns for the Brazilian Grand Prix on 8 November.
He added: “Lewis was running very wide too, but look, I think we also need to keep in mind that we represent a brand, we represent sponsors, we’ve got 2,000 people working behind us who aren’t just racing for the sake of racing; they’re racing for the whole team.”
“Before I joined this team, when I was in Mercedes, I watched and witnessed the back and forth between Charles and Carlos [Sainz] for several races where they were battling so much that the person ahead just pulled away, and they had the pace to actually win the race.
“But it’s one thing when that’s happening for fourth and fifth, as opposed to first and second, and you lose the win. That’s significant.
“The guy’s 28 years old, so I don’t think it’s an age thing. I think it’s a mentality thing. It’s like ‘do or die. Like either I win or none of us do’, and it shouldn’t be that.
“It should be us getting that one-two because it’s still a good feeling.
“Silverstone, I could have gone all kamikaze on him and taken him off and lost us the win, but instead it was first and third.
“For me, I’m happy for the team to have experienced that. But I’m hopeful we’ll work towards a better working place in the future.”
“In the race, I gave it everything," he added.
“Unfortunately the race was lost in the first few corners and it’s a shame because we could have easily finished first and second in this race if we worked together as a team.”
When asked if there had been any discussions about how they would approach the opening lap, Hamilton said: “We didn’t sit down and talk before.
“Again, it’s something I mentioned in the past, but it’s all fair and well racing against your team-mate as long as it’s not to the detriment of the team’s points and the team’s opportunity of getting the result.
“At the end of the day, the team has to come first and today we lost the win for the team, today we lost points, I lost second in the championship and that’s a real shame.
“It affects so many people back at the factory. Luckily, we still got points so we can hold onto second in the constructors’ but it impacts the people that put in all the hard work, and the Tifosi. So it wasn’t good.”
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