Charles Leclerc: “Our aim is to drive as many kilometres as we can”

After ending day one second fastest on Wednesday, Charles Leclerc went to the top of the timing screens on Thursday at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, and the Monegasque racer was delighted to get significant mileage on his F1-75.

The Scuderia Ferrari driver set a best lap of 1:19.689 in the afternoon session and completed seventy-nine laps of the Spanish track, although he acknowledges ending fastest means very little at this stage of testing.  He did suffer a small spin but was able to keep the car going and did not lose any track time.

Leclerc has one more session in the car in Spain on Friday morning, and he hopes the form the team has shown so far continues.

“A pretty good afternoon here in Barcelona!” reflected Leclerc.  “We completed a lot of laps again, which is what counts the most at testing. Our aim is to drive as many kilometres as we can, to complete as many different tests as possible and that’s exactly what we did.

“Again, we should not get ahead of ourselves, because P1 doesn’t mean anything at this stage. We have to keep working extremely hard. Tomorrow is our final day at Barcelona and we have to make the most of it before we turn our attention to Bahrain.”

“It was another productive day” – Carlos Sainz Jr.

Team-mate Carlos Sainz Jr. started the day in the car and was equally pleased with his day, with the Spaniard ending fifth fastest overall.

However, Sainz was happier to get another seventy-one laps in the books and work through their programme more than the lap times, and he continues to grow in confidence behind the wheel of the F1-75.

“It was another productive day in which we were able to complete the whole run programme, which at this stage is the most important thing,” said Sainz.  “We ran both the C2 and C3 tyres and that allowed us to further assess those compounds while trying different set ups in the car.

“Our 71 laps this morning were a good asset and also allowed me to start working a bit more on the driving style, gaining confidence with every lap. I’m satisfied with the work we’ve been able to do so far and I look forward to continuing this trend.”

Carlos Sainz Jr. ended fifth fastest on Thursday – Credit: Scuderia Ferrari Press Office