Why is Hamilton faster than Leclerc? “Lewis manages to exploit 100%, I can’t. In SQ3 I lost the car”

Second Sprint row for Leclerc Probably on Thursday Charles Leclerc would have signed for a fourth place in the Sprint Qualifying at Silverstone, so negative were the forecasts on the performance of the Ferrari SF-26 on the British track. Instead, the Red car surprised everyone with frankly unexpected speed peaks and gave Lewis Hamilton the joy of Sprint pole in his home race.
So Charles Leclerc’s fourth place has a different flavour, given that even today the Monegasque was behind his teammate, who preceded him by 327 thousandths. Why does Charles fare less than Lewis? The Monegasque driver himself explained the reasons for Leclerc’s difficulties compared to Hamilton to F1TV: “For a while now I’ve realized that I don’t have the same ease I had in 2025 with last year’s car. Even when I push hard and put everything together, we’re talking about tenths: Lewis more often manages to exploit 100% of the car’s potential, while I can’t. So I have to work on everything in reality. The most important thing I think is just the feeling with this car, because if you don’t have that feeling, it’s difficult to get a good lap time and have the confidence to go into qualifying. In SQ1 and SQ2 I was close to the limit of the car, and I was quite confident. Once I got to SQ3, I just didn’t feel as good as I would like.

Automobile Magazine – Formula1 English, News

2026-07-03 18:00:00