"The whole weekend has been pretty strong," claims Leclerc after securing second spot for the Mexico City GP

F1 Grand Prix, GP Mexico, Autódromo Hermanos Rodriguez

"The whole weekend has been pretty strong," claimed Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc after having secured the second starting spot for today's Mexico City Grand Prix.

Following a strong display at last weekend’s United States Grand Prix, Ferrari seemingly managed to carry this form over to Mexico, crucially with both cars.

On the back of some strong lap times across the three practice sessions, Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton both arrived in Q3 with two fresh sets of soft tires and put them to good use.

The Monegasque grabbed provisional pole on the first runs with a staggering improvement. Although he managed to find even more time on his second hot lap, he did not have an answer to the pace of Lando Norris and had to settle for second place on the grid.

Lewis Hamilton sat out the opening practice as part of the requirement that forces each driver to hand over the car to a rookie driver twice across the season.

Despite missing FP1, the Briton managed to find a good setup for the unique requirement of the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez to back Leclerc up with his best Grand Prix Qualifying of the year.

Asked whether pole position could have been on the cards for Ferrari, Leclerc said: "A little bit. But yeah, after the first lap in Q3, I thought this was a really good lap. So I knew there was a little bit more to come, but not so much.

"But considering the gaps that were behind, I was like, “OK, let’s see how it goes. I will still go flat out on the second lap and see where we end up”. But I was very surprised, obviously, by the jump Lando did from the first to the second run in Q3.

"I just don’t think we had the pace today to match that. There was a little bit here and there, but I don’t think it would have been enough for pole position anyway."

Pressed on to reveal how Ferrari's SF25 has been in Mexico so far this weekend, Leclerc added: "I think the car was actually really good today. The whole weekend has been pretty strong.

"But on a track like this, it’s very difficult because it’s such a low grip track, and it’s very easy to make a mistake. Whatever small mistake you do is exaggerated in terms of lap time lost. So it was very tough, but I was pretty happy with both of my laps in Q3.

"I think the track got cooler in Q3, and that definitely helped. The grip was a little bit higher, and I felt in some corners I was a little bit under the limit, if anything. But yeah, the car reacted well, and again, I don’t have anything to complain about car-wise.

Signing off with a word for his expectations for the race, the Monegasque added: "[Lando Norris] has got the race pace too. We were speaking about it earlier. I think he will be very strong tomorrow for sure.

"But the start is definitely a chance for us — it's an opportunity for us to try and make something special even though starting second here on the dirty side of the track. I'm not sure it’s great, but it's OK. I’ll just focus on what I can control and hopefully it will be enough to be alongside him into Turn 1."