Charles Leclerc was pleased his recovery drive at the 2022 Canadian GP landed him a fifth-place finish, though how he got there was a frustrating experience.
The Ferrari driver started down in 19th after taking on a raft of new power unit components over the weekend.
In the end he managed to cross the line in fifth, but Leclerc revealed his drive was littered with several frustrating experiences.
“[It was] very frustrating actually,” Leclerc told Sky Sports F1. “The last part was nice, but the first part I was stuck in a DRS train and I couldn’t do anything.
“Then in the middle part I could myself stuck behind Esteban [Ocon] who had much newer tyres. So out of Turn 10, where the tyres make the difference, he had very good traction and that was enough to keep me behind.
“Then it was just about being patient and thinking about the end of the race. We did the pit stop thinking that we had cleared the traffic behind, but we had a slow pit stop and fell behind another DRS train.
“We had to do the job again, but the end was fun. I had to be aggressive to get points, and we finished fifth in the end which is the best we could do considering everything that happened.
Leclerc still confident
Max Verstappen’s win on Sunday means he now holds a 49 point lead over Leclerc, with Sergio Perez three points ahead of the Monegasque as well.
Despite the deficit, Leclerc isn’t ready to give up on his World Championship hopes just yet.
“Yes, yes,” said Leclerc when asked if he can turn things around. “I think reliability seems to be a concern for everyone this season.
“If we fix our reliability the performance is there to come back so already from Silverstone we will try to get a few points back.”
