Leclerc and Hamilton, whose fault?
Sure, Ferrari seemed to have no chance of victory at Monza and even Vasseur after the race had emphasized how the team expected “the toughest race” of the season.
But besides the poor performance, the Prancing Horse made headlines for the tense stories between Hamilton and Leclerc at the first chicane.
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The two started from the second row and found themselves fighting wheel to wheel to get ahead of each other after the first two corners.
Hamilton squeezed inside his teammate at Turn 1 with a somewhat forceful move, but left him space heading into Turn 2. Leclerc did not return the favor, essentially guiding him into the gravel on exit, although he claimed to have tried to take the tightest line possible.
The back and forth
Leclerc wanted to cut it short, admitting that they had “gone too far” at the first chicane.
When Hamilton was told his teammate’s version, the Englishman replied irritably: “I was ahead at Turn 2. At the apex of the corner I was ahead. So there was no ‘we’ in all this.”
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Lewis’s speech
Hamilton was then prodded about the need for a cultural change at Ferrari: “I know what you are trying to do, but I don’t want to argue or fight about my team. I’m doing my best to help the team achieve its goals. Today we didn’t race well and it’s already painful enough to have to reprimand my guys.”
But the Englishman then gave a long speech, implying that he expects a firm hand from Vasseur: “Ultimately it all starts from the top. Decisions have a cascading effect and so it all starts with Fred. Yesterday I said that we need to examine our way of communicating, because if we keep going down the same path, we will get the same results. And we need to change things because this way we are not helping ourselves move forward. I think they are receptive and we will talk about it in private in the coming days, I believe after the next race, to try to understand how we can modify procedures so that the same things don’t happen.”
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