The stewards explain why they penalized Leclerc for his incident with Russell

Following a fierce battle between Charles Leclerc and George Russell, the stewards have offered an explanation why they elected to hand out a penalty to the Monegasque driver.

Ferrari endured mixed emotions in Saturday’s qualifying at the Hungaroring. Lewis Hamilton failed to secure anything better than a P12 on the grid after struggling for pace in constantly-changing weather conditions.

On the other side of the garage, Charles Leclerc also looked to uncomfortable behind the wheel of his SF-25, albeit he progressed into the final part of qualifying. With a storming lap, he grabbed pole position on a track where he never really felt himself competitive.

Come the race, the Monegasque had a great start to maintain the lead into Turn 1. During his first stint, he looked very competitive and was able to build up a margin from his closest rival Oscar Piastri.

Although he appeared to be strong during his second stint as well, his pace unexpectedly faded in the last segment of the Mogyoród race which saw him fall back to P4, ending a disappointing day at the Hungaroring.

After the race, Leclerc has revealed that a technical issue was the cause of his sudden pace loss that saw him drop behind the McLarens of Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris and the Mercedes of George Russell.

The Monegasque was chanceless in his battle with the Mercedes man because of his technical issues. However, he was desperate to fend off Russell's attacks. When the Briton got into the DRS zone of the Ferrari and launched himself down the inside of Turn 1, Leclerc fiercely defended and prompting the Briton to complain that he moved under braking.

Russell tried again at the start of Lap 62 and managed to squeeze through amid some more risky defending from Leclerc, which resulted in a five-second time penalty for the Ferrari.

"The Stewards reviewed video, telemetry and in-car video evidence. Car 63 moved to overtake Car 16 on the inside into Turn 1. Car 16 moved towards Car 63 on the main straight before braking and subsequently moved a second time, now under braking, nearly causing a collision with Car 63.

"The Stewards consider both moves combined to constitute erratic driving. The Stewards took into account that Car 63 succeeded in overtaking Car 16 and that there was no contact and in these circumstances apply a a less severe penalty than might have been applied in different circumstances," the stewards' statement read.

Russell commented: “It’s one of those when you sort of commit to a bit of a divebomb, if the driver in front moves, you’re already right on the limit of grip and there’s not much room for manoeuvre,.

“I think we made contact on the second time, but just glad to get through it. It’s a nice way to go into the break."