Antonelli to Leclerc: “When you were behind me, you forced me to change the engine deployment”

Duel for the victory

The second part of the Belgian GP, after the second Virtual Safety Car came out due to debris on the track, was entirely characterized by the head-to-head battle between Charles Leclerc and Andrea Kimi Antonelli. The Ferrari driver, in fact, taking advantage of the VSC, was able to make his pit stop and come out at the front of the group, with the World Championship leader forced first into a long chase and then to make the decisive on-track overtake for the win. However, Leclerc managed to stay in the slipstream of the Mercedes #12 for several laps even after being overtaken, forcing Antonelli and the entire Brackley team to extract the maximum from their power unit.

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Antonelli’s admission

In the podium area, Antonelli admitted, chatting with Leclerc, information that had already emerged from team radios during the Grand Prix: the pressure brought by the Ferrari driver pushed Mercedes to modify the energy deployment on the W12 of the championship leader, with the intent to prevent Leclerc from staying close and being able to use the Overtake Mode to continue threatening Antonelli.

The chat in the podium area among the top three, besides this particular situation, also showed how the drivers do not seem to like at all, even after many races, this very particular and unpredictable power management that becomes difficult to handle in some cases even for themselves.

Read more Antonelli: “Beautiful victory, but now focus on Budapest. In Hungary, Ferrari will be very strong”

Below is the exchange of words among the top three:

Charles Leclerc: “The deployment was so different, it’s so annoying.”
Max Verstappen: “At the start…”
Charles Leclerc: “Yes, at the start and then…”
Kimi Antonelli [addressing Leclerc]: “When you were behind I had to change my deployment.”
Charles Leclerc: “Ah yes, I saw it because before the last corner you could get away a bit…”
Kimi Antonelli: “Yes, I was at maximum in the last corner.”
Charles Leclerc: “…And then in corner 18 you released the brakes like crazy to take me out of Overtake Mode.”

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