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Charles Leclerc has detailed the full extent of the failure that ended his Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix with only three laps remaining, revealing that his Ferrari lost far more than power steering before he returned to the pits.
The Monegasque had been on course to salvage a strong result from a compromised weekend, having started 10th after his qualifying crash at Turn 4. But what had looked like a determined recovery drive ended abruptly when Leclerc ran through the gravel and brought the SF-26 back to the garage.
Leclerc’s race had been built on immediate progress. By the end of the opening lap, he had climbed from 10th to seventh, underlining that his Ferrari had considerably more pace than its grid position suggested.
His speed also appeared stronger than several cars ahead, including Max Verstappen, and a fourth- or fifth-place finish looked possible before the late technical failure intervened. That made the retirement particularly painful: the performance was there, but the result never came.
The episode followed a difficult qualifying day for Leclerc, with Ferrari already left balancing promise and frustration after Barcelona. For more on that backdrop, read our report on Leclerc feeling ashamed after his Barcelona qualifying crash.
While the failure ended his race, Leclerc also accepted that Ferrari’s strategic path may not have been optimal. Unlike his team-mate, who went on to claim victory, Leclerc stayed on a two-stop strategy rather than switching to three stops.
Speaking to select media, including RacingNews365, Leclerc explained: “Yeah, I lost the power steering. Then, with the VSC, I don’t know if it would have changed our race significantly. Maybe P4 could have been on the cards.”
He added: “But the two-stop strategy was a bit of a mistake on my side. I think the three-stop was a bit better. It wouldn’t have changed my race massively.”
For Leclerc, however, the bigger damage had already been done before lights out. “The biggest problem was starting P10, and that was on me, and then, obviously, the technical problem at the end. We’ll look into what happened.”
The scale of the problem became clearer after the race. Leclerc confirmed he had also lost all gears and braking, making any attempt to continue unrealistic.
Asked whether he could have driven on without power steering, he responded bluntly: “Oh no, no. I had no gears, and I had no brakes as well, so it would have been tough.”
It was a harsh end to a race that had shown genuine pace, but Leclerc’s own assessment was clear: the retirement was technical, yet the lost opportunity began with qualifying.
He’s a software engineer with a deep passion for Formula 1 and motorsport. He co-founded Formula Live Pulse to make live telemetry and race insights accessible, visual, and easy to follow.
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