Charles Leclerc: Good to put a stop to "talk” about F1 qualifying form

Charles Leclerc says it is good to stop people talking about his recent performances after qualifying second for the F1 Miami Grand Prix sprint race.

The Ferrari driver impressively recovered from missing most of the weekend’s only practice session earlier on Friday to narrowly miss out on pole position for the sprint race to Red Bull’s Max Verstappen.

Leclerc is regarded as one of F1’s fastest drivers over a single lap thanks to his pole record but has found himself being questioned after a run of defeats to teammate Carlos Sainz this year.

And the Monegasque hopes Miami will mark the start of a turnaround in form after recent work to get his tyres in the best operating window.

"Qualifying has been the weak point for two races in a row. China was a bit better but we didn't have the car to show that,” Leclerc said.

“On such a difficult weekend, I did one lap in FP1, so had to go into Qualifying and go flat out straight away.

"We only had one set of tyres in SQ1, so it was very, very tricky but straight away I felt the feeling and the hard work I've done earlier in the season, to put the tyres in the right window, has paid off.

"So I'm happy because there is so much talk now and you are as good as your last race in this sport.

"When you have two races in a row, where you are bad in qualifying and I haven't done a great job, people start to talk.

"So it's good to stop that, so now we need to work on the consistency and try to stay at that level and put the tyres consistently in the right window as I've done in the past.”

Leclerc’s weekend appeared to be on the back foot after he was restricted to just a single lap in practice when he spun his Ferrari and stopped on track.

While he admits he is going into the sprint race without any real knowledge about Ferrari’s race pace, Leclerc is hopeful about challenging Red Bull in both the sprint and Sunday’s grand prix.

“P1,” he replied when asked what he can dream of in the sprint.

“I have no idea about our race pace. I did one lap so I have no idea about our race pace but I really hope we can have a good sprint and have a good race pace to have hopes for the win on Sunday.”