Anger and hope
Second row and fourth time, ahead of Verstappen, Russell and Hamilton, but behind the two McLarens and Kimi Antonelli. The Sprint qualifying of Charles Leclerc was decent from the point of view of the final result – confirming an absolutely competitive SF26 with Mercedes and also with the very fast McLaren reappeared in Miami – but the Monegasque showed all his disappointment at the end of the session.
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Leclerc, in fact, after having set the best time in FP1 and shown great speed in the first two qualifying runs, was convinced he could place his red car at least on the front row. His gap from Antonelli, second, was one and a half tenths, but probably all the gap was accumulated by Leclerc in the twisty section between turn 11 and turn 16. The replays broadcast on TV showed in fact some inaccuracies too many by #16 who also gave in to some gestures of disappointment on his in-lap.
A “horrendous” lap
The Ferrari driver, as always hypercritical towards himself, described his lap as “horrendous!” speaking via radio with his race engineer Bryan Bozzi. A comment that testifies to Leclerc’s perfectionism, but also his hunger. Beating Norris’s time would probably have been difficult, but today the front row could have been reached with a perfect lap. This regret, however, gives Ferrari fans good hope for the Sprint and especially for the ‘climactic’ part of the weekend with qualifying and race. The impression is indeed that this Ferrari can challenge Mercedes and McLaren on equal terms.
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