Leclerc confused by 'crazy' Ferrari performance swing

Charles Leclerc has no answer as to why Ferrari's performance varied so much over the Dutch Grand Prix weekend after "struggling like crazy" in qualifying.

The Ferrari driver qualified in sixth and was nine-tenths slower than polesitter Lando Norris, convincing Leclerc that even a top-five finish would be a challenge. 

The SF-24, however, came alive during the race in Zandvoort, allowing Leclerc to perform a successful undercut to salvage a second consecutive P3 finish. 

But Ferrari's performance swing caught the Maranello-based team completely by surprise, with Leclerc suggesting the Scuderia must understand what triggered the boost. 

When asked what caused Ferrari's performance improvement, Leclerc told select media including RacingNews365: "That is a very good question. The best question is to understand why we were nine-tenths off in qualifying and suddenly pretty strong in the race. 

"The car is exactly the same. In qualifying, we were struggling like crazy. On Sunday, we were strong, and these are the kinds of things that we've got to work on. 

"I think as much as we analyse every bad surprise we have during a season, we also need to understand when we do something good. For now, I don't think as a team we have the explanation. 

"So it's a great result, happy to be standing on the podium, and I think it's a really good surprise. However, we've got to understand to perform more often at our best."

Piastri pressure

Leclerc opting to pit first out of the lead drivers saw him undercut George Russell and Oscar Piastri to promote him into third. 

Piastri in clean air was significantly quicker than Leclerc, although a clever strategy from Ferrari kept the Australian driver behind. 

As revealed by Leclerc, maintaining a rhythm during the second half of the race was a real challenge, as Piastri's distance to the 26-year-old varied every lap.

Asked if keeping a rhythm was easy, he replied: "It wasn't, because my engineer was telling me about Oscar's lap time, which when he was in free air was quite a bit quicker than me, I think nearly a second. 

"Then when he got closer, I started to push a bit more and gain five-tenths. I think with the dirty air, he probably lost three or four-tenths. 

"He managed to stay behind and to put me quite under pressure for two, three laps, but then couldn't stay there because of the overheating. It was a really good strategy. 

"I did not expect to keep that third place until the end, but we did a really good job as a team. I don't think there was anything more we could have done."