Charles Leclerc reveals dire Ferrari situation in 'stupid amount of risk' admission

Charles Leclerc has explained why there is no way out of the situation Ferrari finds itself in at the Qatar Grand Prix, arguing the SF-25 is "just not fast enough" to compete with its usual rivals.

The Monegasque driver has endured a torrid weekend at the Lusail International Circuit, though it is nothing compared to team-mate Lewis Hamilton, who was quick out in the first segment of both sprint qualifying and qualifying for the grand prix.

Leclerc lined up for the one-third distance race in ninth, but almost immediately fell backwards with his car visibly difficult to tame. He ultimately took the chequered flag in P13, five places outside the points-paying positions.

Things did not improve in qualifying, either, and the eight-time grand prix winner will start the 57-lap race from tenth on the grid.

When asked by media, including RacingNews365, about his day, a downtrodden Leclerc replied: "It was incredibly difficult.

"The whole weekend has been unbelievably difficult. The car is really, really difficult to drive.

"It's just frustrating. The second lap in Q3 was a really good one, but that's only good enough for P10, and that is, once again, very frustrating. It's been a very difficult weekend so far."

His grid-setting session was punctuated by a high-speed spin during Q3, which the 28-year-old explained was merely a case of pushing his car past its limits.

"I just took a stupid amount of risk, just like I do on every single corner in Q3 to try and get P8 or P9, but it was a little bit too much," he said.

"Then I brought it back for run two of Q3, and that was just fine, and it was a really good lap. But there wasn't anything more in the car."

Leclerc: 'I struggle to find any optimism for the race'

Addressing the root cause of the problem that the SF-25 has with the circuit in Lusail, Leclerc stated it must be related to the high-speed, flowing characteristics of the track.

Unable to compete with the likes of Red Bull and Mercedes, let alone McLaren, he shared his hope that the Italian team will be back to its usual "level" for the season finale.

"Yeah, it has to be, because we've tried different setups, we've tried different approaches, and there's no way out of this situation," he said.

"The car is just not fast enough. It's not like we have a huge balance problem, even though at one point the car is going to slide front or rear whenever you push it to the limit, but we've just got to go too far to that limit to try and extract a little bit of performance. And that makes it very, very, very difficult to drive the car.

"So, just not enough performance, and I hope that in Abu Dhabi, we can come back to our level, but that wouldn't change, obviously, the very disappointing end of the season."

Leclerc could not muster up any confidence in the Maranello-based team enjoying a better grand prix than the weekend that came before it.

"I'm generally a very optimistic person, but I struggle to find any optimism for the race," the Ferrari driver said.

"There's no one lap this weekend that gave me the hope that things can go in the right direction. So a good day will be to keep the car on track and to try and score a few points.

"I don't want to go into a race thinking about taking a few points and keeping the car on track, so I'll try to get into the top 10. But realistically, and do I really believe in it? I honestly don't think so."