Charles Leclerc was left kicking himself after suffering a second crash of the Miami Grand Prix weekend to leave himself with an uphill fight to claim a podium.
In second practice on Friday, Leclerc lost control of his Ferrari in attempting to correct a snap of oversteer through the high-speed Turn 7 sweep which resulted in him skidding straight on and burying the nose of his SF-23 into a barrier.
In the top-1o shoot-out in qualifying, Leclerc lost the back end of his car, leading to him pirouetting across the run-off area before nudging the barrier.
It was an incident that brought out the red flags and an early end to the session as there was not enough time for any driver to add another lap to improve on their times.
Max Verstappen, who made a small error on his first run in Q3 which forced him to abort the lap, was one of those heavily compromised by Leclerc’s spin.
The Red Bull driver was unable to complete a second run to leave him ninth on the grid behind pole-sitting team-mate Sergio Perez.
“I’m really disappointed with myself, really angry with myself,” said Leclerc, who starts seventh.
“I know that qualifying is one of my strong points, and I’m very disappointed with myself again because it’s the same mistake I made (on Friday).
“In those conditions, you can always find excuses – the wind was really strong, the set up of the car was really difficult, or whatever.
“But in the end, I decided on the set-up of the car, and I should have done a better job putting the car where I wanted in Q3.
“So again, I am just very disappointed. I should be driving at a higher level.”
Leclerc wanted ‘difficult-to-drive’ Ferrari
After scoring pole positions for the Sprint and main race across the Azerbaijan Grand Prix weekend, Leclerc was aiming to make it three in a row, albeit in the face of stiff competition from Red Bull.
Leclerc has revealed, though, that in choosing the set-up, he opted for a car from which he knew he would be able to extract more performance, but also would not be easy to handle.
“I know that Q3 has always been a very strong point of mine, and I also know that this comes with taking risks, probably more risks,” added the Monégasque driver.
“Last week, I did a pole position in Baku, and I know I’m taking more risk than others, and that’s why it’s paying off. This weekend, it didn’t pay off.
“I twice did the same mistake on the same weekend, so that’s why I’m really disappointed in myself.
“The car was really difficult to drive, but this is because I wanted the car to be very difficult to drive. I knew I would extract more lap time if I had managed to finish the lap.
“But there’s no point in saying I was doing a good lap if you then don’t finish the lap.”
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