Leclerc sees different kind of dominance at Red Bull compared to past
General
- Cas van de Kleut
The summer break is over, and racing is back. Before the summer break, Red Bull Racing were the dominant team, and chances are they will remain so after the four-week break. Charles Leclerc even thinks the other teams will only have a chance to get close to Max Verstappen's team after the rule change in 2026.
Ferrari seemed to have laid a good foundation for the current regulations with the start of the 2022 season. However, Red Bull have developed the car better than the Italian racing team, who are now only fourth in the constructors' championship. Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz won a combined four races last year, but in 2023 the Ferrari drivers will be pleased with a podium as that has only happened three times this season.
'Hard to catch up with Red Bull before rule change'
During a press event ahead of the Dutch Grand Prix attended by GPblog, Leclerc was asked if the other teams could get close to Red Bull in the coming years: "Well that's what we are trying to work towards but for sure they have a really big margin and it's going to be very very difficult to catch them before the change of regulations."
Leclerc sees different kind of dominance
In the past, teams have been dominant more often than not, but Leclerc says Red Bull's dominance is different from what he has seen before: "I just think it's different than in the past in a way that in qualifying we are much closer than what we had seen in the past. Normally when we see a team dominating it was qualifying and race but now for some reason with Red Bull it's much more in the race than in qualifying."
"The gaps are much bigger in the race than in qualifying and we are all working towards race pace because Red Bull is just so far ahead. There's still a lot of work to do, we have some developments in the next few races that can help us do a step forward. But also with this car we can have some unexpected surprises because they are so sensitive cars that a small change can have a big influence and hopefully it will be the case for us," Leclerc explained.