Charles Leclerc says he didn’t want to risk losing his second place in the Singapore Grand Prix by trying a difficult move in tricky conditions.
The Ferrari driver was on pole position but lost out at the start as Perez took the lead, and spent the rest of the race following the Mexican. After the final safety car restart, Leclerc was putting heavy pressure on Perez as he showed better pace on slick tires but didn’t manage to make a move, and then some small errors allowed a gap to open up that he never managed to close again.
“I was quite surprised because as soon as I lost the DRS I think it was exactly at the time when Checo’s tires started to work properly and unfortunately then I lost it a little bit,” Leclerc said. “Before that everything was really on the limit — with the dirty air in conditions like this the slightest mistake you pay big time.
“The conditions were really, really tricky and mistakes can be very easy to do. So as soon as I knew that the five-second gap was done, I just brought the car home.”
