F1 News - Formula 1: Charles Leclerc & Sebastian Vettel will be 'less aggressive'
https://ift.tt/2rA7bpY Charles Leclerc says he and Ferrari team-mate Sebastian Vettel will be "less aggressive with each other" following their crash in Brazil. The two have spent time with the team discussing the incident in which they collided disputing fourth place at the last race at Interlagos two weeks ago. Leclerc said: "We will be able to race. We're both competitive and want to win. "We need to find the right compromise - we both race for the same team. We need to give each other a bit more space." Leclerc was speaking in the official news conference before the season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. Vettel was also due to attend but was allowed to arrive late at Yas Marina following the birth of his third child. Leclerc said that he and Vettel had spoken about the incident and agreed both could have done more to avoid it. The crash happened when Vettel was trying to re-take fourth place approaching Turn Four after Leclerc had passed him into Turn One with five laps to go. Vettel moved over on Leclerc and his left rear wheel hit Leclerc's front right, breaking his suspension and giving the German a puncture. Leclerc said: "We called with Seb and we tried to understand both our situations. "Seb probably shouldn't have gone to the left and he knows it, and I could have done a better job of avoiding him going to the left. What is important is everything is clear now and we move forward." He added: "We looked at it - and I particularly looked at it - to try to understand how we could have made things better. "The consequences were huge but the impact was very small, so that was a little bit unlucky. It was unfortunate but we will make sure it doesn't happen again." Pressure between the twoThe incident was the latest in a series of controversies between the two Ferrari drivers this season. Pressure has been building all year as Leclerc has emerged as a major force in F1 and threatened Vettel's primacy in the team and has more wins, poles and points than his four-time champion team-mate. In the early races of the season, there were a series of team orders calls, usually in Vettel's favour. These stopped happening as Leclerc established a general superiority through the mid-season and out-qualified Vettel for nine races in a row. But from September tension has grown between the two. At the Italian Grand Prix, Leclerc failed to carry out his side of an agreement in which each driver agreed to give the other a slipstream in qualifying, which angered Vettel. Ferrari then inadvertently managed to get Vettel ahead of Leclerc and into the lead in Singapore when simply trying to pass Lewis Hamilton's Mercedes, who was between the two Ferraris. And in the subsequent race in Russia, Vettel directly ignored a team order to let Leclerc back into the lead as part of a pre-arranged plan to ensure the two Ferraris were running one-two. Leclerc had qualified on pole, with Vettel third, and Leclerc agreed to give his team-mate a tow down to the first corner and let him past, to ensure he overtook Hamilton, who had qualified second. Ferrari team boss Mattia Binotto has told the drivers the incident in Brazil was "not acceptable" and said the team "know how to move forward". #F1 via BBC Sport - Formula 1 https://ift.tt/OHg7x6 November 28, 2019 at 07:51AM Leave a Reply. |
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11/28/2019
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