Charles Leclerc took part in the FIA press conference in the Jeddah paddock today while Carlos Sainz felt unwell and went back to his hotel, although he is expected to be back at the track tomorrow as usual. The Monegasque said he was keen to see how the SF-24 would deal with a completely different track to the one in Bahrain. “Here we have a smooth asphalt and high speed corners unlike in Sakhir,” he commented. “I’d say the two tracks are polar opposites, so it will be interesting to see if the encouraging signs we saw a week ago are confirmed here.”
Street enthusiast. Charles reaffirmed his love of racing between the walls. “The Jeddah Corniche track is not a true street circuit but it has many similarities with one of them. I like to progress step by step from the start of free practice in order to find the limit. It reminds me of my karting days and in qualifying, if you find the right compromise between risk and speed then you get a good result.”
F1 Academy. Charles also commented on the F1 Academy, whose season starts in Jeddah. “I’m very happy that the platform has all this support from Formula 1. There’s a car in Ferrari colours driven by Maya Weug and another Scuderia Ferrari Driver Academy girl racing in Puma colours. I’ll be watching the races closely.”