Lewis Hamilton says he will apologize to Charles Leclerc for not giving his teammate a position at the end of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.
Ferrari split the strategy with two cars on Sunday, with Hamilton starting with a hard compound from the 12th and starting Leclerc in media from the 10th. That meant that Hamilton was making medium tires faster late in the race, and when he caught Leclerc he was stuck behind a line of cars, including Liam Lawson, Yuki Tsunoda and Lando Norris – Ferrari imposed a team order on Hamilton to try and find a way.
When Hamilton did not do so, instructions were given to swap positions again at the end stage, but he says he still couldn’t make the move right as Leclair still crossed the line before he overtook him, despite the seven-time world champions slowing down significantly in pit straights.
“I was obviously fast, but Charles was graceful to let go of me,” Hamilton said. “At the end, I got the message really late with that, and it seemed like I was being zoned to the car in front of me.
“Basically I lifted it up on a straight and actually put on the brakes, but he missed it like a quarter, so that was a misunderstanding from myself, so I’ll apologise to Charles.
“We never talked about it before because we were never in that position.”
Leclerc himself downplayed the incident, but says that if the two drivers were fighting for a more important point it’s more problematic.
“I think that was very clear, but I don’t mind the last place eighth,” Leclerc said. “I don’t think this should be a hot topic. Unfortunately, we’re very late throughout the weekend and that’s where we should focus. It’s fine as P8 or P9, or P9 or P8 is not something that’s really interesting.
“There are rules that we know we have to work together, and perhaps those rules weren’t respected, but again, P8/P9, P9/P8 are small. Obviously, we hope that’s the case.
The weekend was frustrating to see Ferrari appearing fast throughout practice, but Hamilton, who has broken through FP2, says his racial outcome was a by-product of poor qualifications and there were obvious signs of progress on his side of the garage.
“That’s definitely not where we want to be. It’s obviously a disappointing result at the end of the day, but I moved forward from the 12th. It was positive. I got off to a good start. I think my pace was generally good.
“It was difficult to close the car ahead. They’re very fast. Obviously it’s very important to qualify, and we missed it. If they see Williams who finished qualifying there, there’s a lot of positive things to take from that, and I’ll definitely draw from the weekend.
