Leclerc’s wet weather troubles “behind us” after Silverstone practice – Vasseur

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In the round-up: Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur says Charles Leclerc’s laps in damp conditions during first practice for the British Grand Prix helped him get on top of the problems he’s had with the car in wet weather.

In brief

Leclerc’s wet laps in Silverstone cured struggles in damp conditions – Vasseur

Leclerc got to the bottom of the difficulties he’d experienced handling Ferrari’s SF-23 in damp conditions by running laps on slick tyres during the rain-hit first practice session at Silverstone, said Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur.

Vasseur said Leclerc’s performance at Spa-Francorchamps showed his struggles in mixed conditions were “behind us”, thanks to the confidence he gained from that run at Silverstone.

“He had two difficult races in a row,” Vasseur said. “He had Barcelona – the quali – and then Spielberg, or Canada, but in mixed conditions.

“He wanted to do some laps with slicks in Silverstone on the wet also to have a good feeling without pressure, without lap time, and I think he did it and he did perfectly.”

Vasseur said he always expected Leclerc would get to the bottom of the problems he’d had. “I was not worried at all because I’ve known him for ages, and he was always performing in these kind of conditions.

“I think he had a poor session in Barcelona, that didn’t go pretty well, but I think the conditions were more than tricky, and he was a bit surprised with this. But it’s behind us. He showed that in these tricky conditions, he was able to be consistently in the front of the pack and he did a good job.”

Wolff suffers arm injury while mountain biking

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Toto Wolff has suffered an apparent arm injury in a biking accident during the first week of the summer break.

A photograph of the Mercedes team principal, posted by his wife Susie on social media, showed him with his left arm in a cast. She said this picture “shows how the downhill mountain biking ended for Toto…”

It is the second time Wolff has been injured while cycling during F1’s summer break, having broken his arm in another accident in August 2014.

Bottas hopeful Alfa Romeo can make step forward after break

Valtteri Bottas is hopeful that Alfa Romeo’s upgrades coming after the summer break will give them a step forward as they pursue Williams and Haas ahead in the constructors’ championship.

Bottas and team mate Zhou Guanyu took their best qualifying results of the season in Hungary but failed to convert it into points, with the pair also just missing out on points in 12th and 13th, respectively, in Spa.

“I think we need to analyse and reset over the break and then come fresh to the second half,” Bottas said.

“Also with the upgrade we have after the break, we’re hoping that’s going to give us a step. But now, just need to reset a little bit.”

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Comment of the day

This weekend’s Caption Competition winner is Ruben!:

“Don’t put stickers on my head, I’m not wearing my budget cap…”
Ruben

Thanks to everyone who came up with caption idea this week and a special mention to Dean Stewarrt, Derek Edwards, RBAlonso and Richard Hill who all came up with particularly good captions.

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday to Matthew Mcmahon, Penelope Pitstop, Ell, Foleyger, Mitch and Sunil Kumar!

On this day in motorsport

  • 35 years ago today Ayrton Senna saw off an attack from team mate Alain Prost to win the Hungarian Grand Prix, leaving the pair tied at the top of the championship

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Will Wood
Will has been a RaceFans contributor since 2012 during which time he has covered F1 test sessions, launch events and interviewed drivers. He mainly...

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3 comments on “Leclerc’s wet weather troubles “behind us” after Silverstone practice – Vasseur”

  1. Profile Photo

    BasCB (@bascb)
    7th August 2023, 9:04

    Well, it’s good if Charles found out what he/the team was doing wrong in those circumstances. I hope we can see him having more stand out performances in those kind of sessions then. But it really doesn’t solve the issues Ferrari have with their car and their strategic choices.

  2. Profile Photo

    Esploratore (@esploratore1)
    7th August 2023, 13:14

    Good point about vasseur knowing him for ages, I was always thinking he had a certain confidence on leclerc even when he had a difficult weekend, when he was outperformed by sainz, and now it hit me: leclerc was in sauber with vasseur before coming to ferrari, and his debut at a backmarker was impressive enough to consider him verstappen’s equal imo, so I understand why he’s always speaking so highly of him.

  3. Profile Photo

    BasCB (@bascb)
    7th August 2023, 19:26

    Looks like the story of Haas still delivering machine tools in Russia has not disappeared after that first instance it was uncovered last year

Comments are closed.