Charles Leclerc “cautious” over Ferrari F1 upgrade but “it’s a good sign for the future”

Charles Leclerc is remaining “cautious” over whether Ferrari’s new F1 upgrade has cured their bouncing problem.

Since introducing a significant upgrade for the Spanish Grand Prix, Ferrari have struggled with bouncing in high-speed corners.

For the British GP, they were forced to revert back to their older package because of the high-speed nature of the Silverstone.

For this weekend, Ferrari brought a huge upgrade to Monza, centred around at curing their weakness.

Leclerc revealed “everything looks better” in terms of the data - but is unsure if their issues have finally been eradicated given the nature of Monza.

“Yes, I will be a bit more cautious, Monza is normally a track where usually we don't have these kind of issues,” Leclerc said.

“Last year it was a pretty good race for us in terms of those weak characteristics of the bouncing. I think we did a step forward.

“From numbers. everything looks much better, I don't think we would have suffered from bouncing anyway on this track even with the old package. But everything we were expecting from this floor is there. So, it's a good sign for the future.”

Teammate Carlos Sainz had a similar view on the upgrade package.

He said: “There's definitely low bouncing for us here this weekend. So TBC, if it's the new floor and we need to go to other tracks to double check, because here, anyway, it has always been low bouncing. But it is promising.”

In terms of Ferrari’s qualifying display, they secured fourth and fifth on the grid for Sunday’s race.

Leclerc bemoaned “understeer” in the opening part of the lap for the gap to the McLarens.

“It’s frustrating because we were close, but it's not enough,” he explained. “Turn 1, 2, 4/5 we've had exactly the same issue since FP1. FP2 just understeer-y can't rotate the car. FP3 for some reason there wasn't the problem anymore. And then qualifying it came back, that's what is frustrating because we lose two tenths and a half in four corners at the beginning of the lap.

“Then, to come back is very difficult. Again, it's the way it is, now we've got to focus on the race pace tomorrow. Don't expect to have as much of an issue into Turn 1/2, 4/5 and hopefully that will help our race pace.”