Charles Leclerc believes Ferrari will eventually get themselves back amongst Red Bull in the “future”; however, the Monegasque is clearly lacking confidence in what is possible this season.
Ferrari and Leclerc have endured a woeful start to 2023, with the side having slumped to fourth in the Constructors’ Championship.
Whilst their one lap pace hasn’t been an issue, high tyre degradation has resulted in both Leclerc and Carlos Sainz being unable to challenge the frontrunners, with the side having claimed just one podium this year.
That came courtesy of Leclerc in Azerbaijan, where the 25-year-old also claimed pole position twice.
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Leclerc finds himself behind Sainz in the Drivers’ Championship having retired from two races this season, with the Monegasque having openly admitted that Ferrari simply haven’t made as big a step as Red Bull.
Red Bull are already 146 points ahead of Ferrari in the standings, with Leclerc recognising that the gap isn’t set to change imminently, with him instead looking to the future.
“The car [is] doing exactly what we expected it to do, so it’s not like we did a bad job [or] we didn’t arrive at our expectations,” Leclerc said.
“But unfortunately, Red Bull did twice [as much of] a step compared to us, so I think it’s more where we fixed the targets than anything else.”
“I’m confident for the future, probably not for the short-term, because the gap to Red Bull is significant, but I am sure that we will come back.”
Leclerc wasn’t able to give a set timeframe on when Ferrari will be able to compete with Red Bull once again, having pushed them for so long last season.
“I don’t want to give a timeframe, but we’ll work as hard as possible for it to be as quickly as possible,” he stated.
Unlike Mercedes, Ferrari don’t appear to be keen on changing their current concept, with Leclerc believing it’s “still too early” to decide whether what they have now works or not.
He did reveal, though, that the Maranello-based team do have “some ideas” how to improve the SF-23, meaning the Italians could get amongst the fight for second in the standings as the season develops.
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“For the car concept, we are looking into it, and it is still too early to take conclusions out of it,” Leclerc said.
“It hasn’t worked the way we wanted, but that doesn’t mean we need to change completely from now.
“But we have some ideas on where we need to work on.”