Vasseur reveals the reason for Leclerc's shock pole position in Mogyoród
On the back of Ferrari's first pole position of the season, Fred Vasseur insisted that the constantly-changing conditions made it difficult for his drivers to put together clean laps in Satuday's qualifying.
Ferrari endured a challenging day at the Hungaroring. Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton displayed great pace in final practice, ending up third and fourth, respectively.
However, the conditions changed massively for qualifying, with track temperatures having dropped and the wind having picked up. This seemingly affected Ferrari more than their rivals.
Hamilton struggled in Q1, but made it through into Q2, albeit he was unable to achieve anything more than a P12 on the grid for tomorrow’s Budapest race.
His team-mate Leclerc struggled across the opening two sessions as well, but progressed into Q3. After his first hot lap, he found himself in a disappointing P7, but he delivered again when it mattered to secure an absolutely astonishing pole position for tomorrow’s Hungarian Grand Prix.
Speaking of the Scuderia's qualifying session at the Hungarian Grand Prix, Ferrari team boss Fred Vasseur revealed that conditions made it very tricky for drivers to extract the most from the tyres.
"This was not an easy pole as we struggled in Q1 and Q2 to get the tyres in the right window and we were not far off having both our cars out in Q2. Conditions were changing massively, with even some rain in Q2. Then in the end, Charles found the way to put the tyres in the right window and the correct spot on the out lap.
"It was a mega lap and it’s a very positive performance seeing that the delta between P10 and P1 is so small. Lewis was very close to Charles and failed to make the cut but just 15 thousandths of a second.
"He will definitely have a tough time in the race. As for tomorrow, we saw yesterday that we had a strong and consistent pace over a long run even compared to McLaren.
Offering his expectations for the race, Vasseur stated: "For the race, we must focus on ourselves, have a good strategy and the right approach for the tyres. If we do that, we can have a good one as our race pace is generally stronger than our quali pace."
