Leclerc praises Ferrari for doing ‘homework’ amid tyre gamble in Sprint as he celebrates P2 finish

Charles Leclerc was pleased that his and Ferrari’s gamble to start on the soft tyres in the Dutch Grand Prix Sprint paid off, with the Monegasque believing that his climb to P2 showed the squad had “done our homework”.

When the tyre blankets were removed ahead of the 24-lap event, it was revealed that only Leclerc and Haas’ Ollie Bearman had bolted on the C4 rubber as the rest of the field opted for the C3 medium compound.

The decision would prove to be a good one for Leclerc, who fought McLaren’s Lando Norris for second place throughout the Sprint before eventually finding a way past on Lap 18.

Asked what he was thinking when he realised at the start that most of the grid were running the medium tyres, Leclerc answered: “Always when you’re the only one doing something, it’s either very right or very wrong.

“I think it was a good choice in the end so that’s good – it means we did our homework well in FP1. Surely when I was on the grid, you just hope to have made the right choice.”

After having to bide his time behind Norris, the Ferrari driver admitted that he was surprised to gain a place towards the end of the Sprint given his choice of tyre.

“I knew Lando didn’t have much deployment on the main straight so I knew I had to maximise that, but then we still arrived at the braking point more or less at the same level,” he said of his overtake.

“It worked out, which was good. I did not expect to gain positions at the end of the race with these soft tyres – if anything, it [would’ve been] at the start."

The result marks a positive start to the resumption of the campaign for Leclerc and Ferrari, with the 28-year-old adding: “The car has been feeling good since FP1, which is a good thing to start the second half of the season like that.”

On the other side of the garage, Lewis Hamilton came home in sixth. The seven-time World Champion had not felt comfortable with his car during Friday’s Sprint Qualifying, an issue that he admitted had persisted into Saturday.

“It was the same through [Sprint] Qualifying, as you would expect, which was a bit frustrating,” Hamilton explained.

“But even if the car felt better, it’s so hard to overtake here, especially on the same tyre. I think we’ll definitely make some changes. Hopefully we can get the car to be a bit better, closer to P1, first practice, and hopefully we can fight from there.”