F1: Charles Leclerc Wants Ferrari To Sacrifice 2021 For 2022

On the 'F1 Beyond the Grid' podcast, Ferrari superstar Charles Leclerc has revealed that he has been pushing the team to focus more on the 2022 season which involves dramatic rules changes to the sport. He is of the opinion that Ferrari belongs at the top of the sport and anyways fighting for P3 is not its main aim. Hence, he is alright to sacrifice the potential P3 in 2021 in its fight against McLaren but instead wants the team to focus more on the next season because any advantage next season could last for a couple of years. 

"If you had the contract in front of me telling me that we sacrifice 2021 for a competitive 2022, I will be happy to take it - but nobody has this guarantee, unfortunately. [I'm pushing the team] more to focus on 2022. And I think this is clear for everyone. 2022 will be a huge opportunity for everyone. These new cars are going to stay for many years after that. This year, OK, we are still fighting with McLaren for the third place in the constructors, but at the end, we know that our goal is to fight for the first position very, very soon, and this will be from 2022 onwards, and not this year," said the young Monegasque on the podcast.

The Ferrari SF21 has been on pole twice this year, though its best result has been P2 by Sainz

"So I will be happy to give up about the third place in the constructors in 2021 to be fighting for the first place in 2022," Leclerc added. This bit of information builds on top of what Ferrari executives have been already saying. Mattia Binotto, the Ferrari team principal and Laurent Mekies, the sporting director have already revealed numerous times that development for the SF21 is more or less over. Back in May Mekies said 95 per cent of the work is focused on the 2022 car. 

Ferrari is preparing to launch a cutting edge new race simulator as well in September which will help it develop the 2022 car better. Leclerc recently revealed that he had tested the 2022 car on the simulator. Ferrari is currently P4 in the constructor's championship in a tight battle with McLaren. Primarily its struggles have been related to the technical regulations for the power unit that were issued at the end of the 2019 season. Because of COVID and development freeze issues, it hasn't been able to fully develop the car to fix the issues. In 2022, it plans on having the most powerful engine on the grid, though beating Mercedes and Honda will not be easy.