Vasseur praises ‘strong weekend’ for Ferrari despite ‘difficult’ race for Leclerc

Ferrari team boss Fred Vasseur was pleased with how Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc fared in Canada, as the former bagged his second podium of the season with a P2 finish, while the Monegasque driver came home fourth.

The result was especially encouraging considering Ferrari did not bring any more upgrades to Montreal, having introduced a big package last time out in Miami. By contrast, Mercedes and McLaren did have new parts – leaving the pecking order a little unknown at the front.

Ferrari seemed to be a fraction behind McLaren in Canada, not helped by a few mistakes in Qualifying from Hamilton, who was clearly the quicker of the Ferrari drivers all weekend. But the team were helped by McLaren's decision to start both drivers on the intermediate tyre, which ultimately dropped the papaya cars out of contention.

“Overall, it's a strong weekend with a strong performance from the team. Lewis was on the positive side all over the weekend, from Lap 1 in FP1 to the last lap of the race,” Vasseur said afterwards.

“The confidence was there and in these conditions, very cold conditions, poor grip, you need to have the confidence to build up the energy into the tyres and it went very well."

Hamilton does have a stellar record in Montreal, with seven wins at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve. He was quick throughout the weekend, challenging the Mercedes cars off the line on Sunday and pulling off a great late overtake on Max Verstappen to grab his best result of the season – labelling it his ‘happiest day at Ferrari so far’.

Hamilton’s jubilance was balanced by Leclerc though, who struggled more than his team mate and called it the ‘most difficult weekend of my career'. Even though he came home fourth – a credible result – the Monegasque driver was frustrated over the radio during the race, and afterwards when he spoke to the media.

He regularly said he might hit the wall, such was his lack of grip in both Qualifying and the Grand Prix, while he also chastised his Race Engineer for talking too much and at the wrong times, clearly ill at ease in the Ferrari cockpit.

“It was a bit more difficult for the opposite reasons with Charles,” Vasseur admitted.

“He was not very confident from the beginning but overall it's a good result from him to bring the car back to P4 and score good points. We were expecting a tough weekend in Montreal because the competitors brought upgrades and we didn't.

“It's probably positive for us. Now we have to be focused on the next one, but Monaco is a completely different story with different conditions and we have to perform next weekend also.”

Ferrari sit second in the Teams' Championship behind Mercedes after five rounds, with Leclerc's home race in Monaco up next for the team.