Charles Leclerc: Ferrari must learn from Red Bull to improve F1 race strategy

Charles Leclerc has publicly called on Ferrari to learn from Red Bull in order to improve the quality of its race strategy, following a Grand Prix that the driver himself described as "strange" – a race in which everything that could go wrong did go wrong, and everything that could go right went right at precisely the decisive moments. The Monegasque driver did not blame himself, and he did not shift responsibility onto his team-mate Lewis Hamilton. Instead, he pointed to a systemic issue: Ferrari's decision-making process in mixed weather conditions has not yet reached Red Bull's operational standard.

This is not the first time the Maranello team has faced questions over its strategy. But this time the person speaking out is Ferrari's lead driver, and the remarks were made publicly to international media, at the team widely regarded as the biggest in Formula 1. The weight of the criticism is therefore far greater than that of a single on-track mistake.

1. How the race unfolded: from P4 and P2 to the back of the field

The race took place in mixed weather conditions – rain had fallen, but the track surface was drying. This is the most punishing kind of condition for strategists, because the boundary between intermediates and slicks shifts from lap to lap, and even from corner to corner. Before the race began, Ferrari decided to put both cars on soft slick tyres. Charles Leclerc started from P4, Lewis Hamilton from P2. After a single lap, both had dropped to the rear of the field.

Charles Leclerc fell to last place. Lewis Hamilton fell to 15th. This was the direct consequence of soft slicks being unable to maintain temperature and grip on a still-damp surface. Meanwhile, Max Verstappen – who started on intermediates – converted pole position into victory, marking the 72nd Grand Prix win of his career. Red Bull also put Isack Hadjar on intermediates, and both cars from the Austrian team were on the right path from the outset.

By lap 13, the rest of the grid had abandoned intermediates for slicks, confirming that the track really had dried. But for Ferrari, the damage had been done long before. Charles Leclerc had to pit at the end of a damp first lap – a fast correction, but one that could not undo the positions lost on track.

2. The slick-tyre call: a gamble that was never split

The most notable element of Ferrari's decision was not that the team chose slicks. Six teams chose slicks for at least one car. The notable element is that Ferrari was one of only two teams – alongside Alpine – that declined to split strategy across its two cars. In other words, Ferrari concentrated its entire risk exposure into a single outcome.

Splitting strategy is a standard risk-management tool in mixed conditions. When a team puts one car on intermediates and one on slicks, it accepts that one of the two cars will go the wrong way, but it caps the maximum damage at half its force. Ferrari did not do that.

Charles Leclerc acknowledged that he understood this logic and that the team had weighed it. He said: "When you split the cars, by definition there is one very wrong choice and one very good choice. It is very difficult to have an in-between scenario." That remark shows the Monegasque driver does not oppose the principle of splitting strategy; he simply points out that the mechanism itself always carries a cost.

Notably, Charles Leclerc did not distance himself from the decision. He stated clearly: "I was aligned with the team. It was a close call." He also said the team would discuss whether splitting the cars in those conditions is the best possible approach. The phrasing is constructive rather than accusatory, and it frames the problem at process level rather than at individual level.

3. What Leclerc said: diagnosing a process failure

What makes Charles Leclerc's remarks notable is not their severity but their technical precision. He did not say Ferrari picked the wrong tyre. He said Ferrari misread the state of the track surface. Specifically, he said: "There was a lot more water than I think the majority thought there was." That is a statement about information quality, not about car quality.

Charles Leclerc also pointed out that the data the team held did not represent the actual conditions of the race. He said: "We had a bit of data on our side, but it is in conditions that have nothing to do with the conditions we had today." That is an important admission: prior dry-weather running data cannot be transferred into data for a surface that is both damp and drying.

On the race as a whole, Charles Leclerc said: "A strange race... everything that could go wrong went wrong... everything that could have gone right went right." That phrasing both acknowledges the luck factor and implicitly concedes that Ferrari's final result does not fully reflect its true level.

4. Why Ferrari did not split strategy between its two cars

The central question analysts raised is this: why would a team with two top-line drivers not use that advantage to spread risk? Charles Leclerc gave an answer rooted in strategic philosophy: when you split the cars, the team knows in advance that one car will be wrong. That means the team cannot optimise the outcome for both cars at once; it can only optimise the average outcome.

However, in a race where both cars could lose almost all their positions within a single lap, accepting that one car is wrong is clearly the lower-risk option. The lesson here is not "always split the cars"; it is "correctly assess the level of uncertainty in the situation before deciding".

This is where Ferrari is judged to be behind Red Bull. Not because Ferrari lacks ideas, but because Ferrari lacks a consistent mechanism for adjusting decisions when uncertainty rises.

5. Red Bull and Hannah Schmitz: the advantage lies in people

Charles Leclerc named the rival Ferrari needs to learn from: "There is one team in particular – and that is Red Bull – that gets it right most of the time with both cars." He added: "For that we need to understand what they are doing better than we do."

Significantly, Red Bull is described as operationally very sharp, led by chief strategist Hannah Schmitz. The fact that a specific individual is named shows that Red Bull's strategic edge is not random luck but an organisational asset built and maintained over years.

In an era when technical regulations keep narrowing the performance gap between teams, operational quality becomes a decisive competitive advantage. Red Bull holds that advantage; Ferrari is trying to close it.

6. The technical factor: water in the holes of the tarmac

The decisive technical variable in this race was not engine power and not aerodynamics, but the drainage behaviour of the track surface. Charles Leclerc pointed out that the biggest question mark is "how much water there is in the holes of the tarmac".

This is a micro-level property of the surface – something the naked eye cannot assess accurately. When engineers look down at the track and see a surface that "looked pretty dry", they are drawing a conclusion from visual intuition. But the pores of the asphalt still retain water, and that water is enough to destroy the grip of soft slick tyres.

This was a failure of information quality, not of car quality. The Ferrari car did not lack performance in this race. What was missing was a reliable enough surface-wetness measurement system to support the decision.

7. The problem of transferring dry-condition data to damp conditions

Charles Leclerc admitted that the data the team held did not represent the actual conditions. That is a significant technical problem: long-run data gathered in dry conditions transfers very poorly to a surface that is damp but drying.

In dry conditions, soft slicks operate within a stable temperature window. In damp-but-drying conditions, that window narrows and shifts continuously. A model built on dry data will misforecast the moment slicks begin to work effectively.

This is why leading teams invest in modelling dedicated to the intermediate-to-slick crossover point. Ferrari, according to its own driver, does not yet have a model good enough for this scenario.

8. The Mercedes power unit failure and Ferrari's P3 and P4

Another significant event shaped the final result: George Russell retired with only 5 laps remaining, due to a power unit failure on his Mercedes. That failure directly lifted Ferrari's finishing positions.

Charles Leclerc finished P4, Lewis Hamilton P3. But this result was partly a gift rather than a pure achievement. Had George Russell completed the race, Ferrari would in all likelihood have lost at least one position in the race classification.

This is an important warning sign. A P3 and P4 result can create the impression that Ferrari recovered successfully, when in reality the team still carries a performance gap to Red Bull and Mercedes.

9. Mercedes is stronger than the points table shows

Charles Leclerc offered a notable assessment: "Kimi and Max were just too strong for us today, and we were right after and we finished P3, P4." Placing Kimi Antonelli and Max Verstappen in the same group indicates that Mercedes' raw pace exceeded its finishing positions.

George Russell was also quick before his power unit failure. This means Mercedes' true level in this race was higher than the points table shows. And that places Ferrari third in the real hierarchy, not second.

This is a meaningful downgrade for any narrative of a Ferrari resurgence. On the evidence of this race, Ferrari is the best of the rest, not yet a race-winning force.

10. A data-verification note on the race venue

One point must be stated clearly in the interest of information transparency: the source material describes the race as the "Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia", held at Sepang. This is a material internal inconsistency in the original document.

Specifically, Sepang International Circuit has not hosted a World Championship round since 2026. In addition, no race designated "Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia" exists on the F1 calendar. At the same time, the described grid – including Kimi Antonelli at Mercedes, Lewis Hamilton at Ferrari, Franco Colapinto at Alpine and Isack Hadjar at Red Bull – maps to a mid-2020s season.

Any conclusion that depends on the specific venue of the race should therefore be treated with lower confidence. Conclusions about tyre strategy, decision-making process and the balance of power between teams remain valid, because they do not depend on the name of the race.

11. Media and brand consequences

The story about Ferrari's strategy is not a new one. It has become a long-running topic in Formula 1. For that reason, the media amplification in this case tends to exceed the actual factual weight of a single mistake.

When a lead driver of Formula 1's biggest team publicly criticises his own team's process, the brand impact is substantial. Ferrari has an enormous commercial base, but operational credibility is a soft metric that sponsorship partners increasingly weigh.

On the other side, Red Bull benefits from this narrative. The image of a team that operates precisely, chooses the right tyre for both cars and converts pole into victory is a valuable brand asset.

12. Risks and recommendations for Ferrari

Ferrari's biggest risk does not lie in the car; it lies in the process. A repeated misread of the tyre crossover in mixed conditions can recur at any wet race, and each occurrence can cost dozens of points.

The second risk is result quality. Ferrari finishing P3 and P4 thanks to a rival's failure can mask the real performance gap. Over-reading this result is a trap.

The third risk is internal pressure. The fact that the lead driver publicly raised a process question shows that Ferrari's strategy department is under strain. A process review is a sensible step, but it needs to produce a change of mechanism rather than a change of slogan.

Three specific recommendations follow. First, establish a default split-strategy policy in mixed weather conditions. Second, invest in modelling dedicated to the intermediate-to-slick crossover point. Third, set up a real-time track-surface wetness measurement mechanism instead of relying on visual observation.

13. Conclusion

Charles Leclerc's remarks are not a complaint. They are a precise diagnosis of Ferrari's competitive weakness in this race: the team did not lose because the car was slow, but because its decision-making process was slow and inconsistent in the face of uncertainty.

The lesson Charles Leclerc himself draws is a lesson about decision quality under uncertainty, not a rigid rule that cars must always be split. Ferrari has two top-line drivers, a strong technical base and sufficient resources to close the operational gap. What is missing is consistency.

In a championship where the performance gap between teams is increasingly compressed by technical regulations, operational quality becomes the decisive margin. Red Bull holds that advantage. Ferrari knows it needs to learn, and the fact that its number-one driver said so publicly is the first step in a process of change.