Last Updated on August 3 2025, 1:13 pm
Ferrari were flying high come the final six rounds of 2024. They had the quickest car in the field and closed the gap to McLaren from 79 to just 14 points come the end of the season finale in Abu Dhabi.
Yet a decision to build a car for 2025 that was “99% new”, was revealed by team boss Fred Vasseur at theMaranello festive lunch. In the final year of this set of F1 car design regulation, McLaren and others decided to evolve their 2024 challengers rather than start again with a blank sheet of paper.
With seven times world champion Lewis Hamilton joining the team, expectations in Italy were high that Ferrari could finally put to bed the seventeen year drought since their last constructor’s championship, but in the curtain raiser in Australia the writing was again on the wall for the Scuderia as on Sunday Charles Leclerc could manage just eighth and Lewis Hamilton rounded out the top ten.
Ferrari slow in 2025 qualifying
Hamilton’s pole and win in the China Sprint in round two, proved to be a false dawn for him and the team and just 24 hours later, both cars were disqualified after the Grand Prix for technical breaches which ultimately was the responsibility of the team.
Ferrari have not been quick enough in qualifying this season and for Charles Leclerc to take pole position in Hungary was clearly a big surprise even for the Monegasque driver, who admitted after the session it was “the most unexpected” of the 27 of his F1 career to date.
Across the first fourteen Grand Prix qualifying sessions in 2025, Leclerc has averaged sixth place exactly, whilst Lewis Hamilton is almost three spots back with an average starting position of 8.87 on Sundays. This alone reveals the extent of Ferrari’s surprise in Budapest, as Leclerc claimed the qualifying top spot by 0.026 of a second from Oscar Piastri.
Yet the tale of qualifying could have been very different for the Scuderia, who struggled to make it out of Q1 with last minute runs from both derivers. Hamilton failed to manage the same Houdini act in the following session, whilst Charles Leclerc realised after a poor first run, something had to change.
Leclerc demands his strategy
As the Monegasque returned to the pit lane ahead of his second Q2 run, he radioed his engineer giving him and the team a firm instruction. “Focus please on one thing which is to go out as soon as possible, not care about anything else. I want the least cars possible at the exit of the pit lane.”
Whether the Ferrari driver had learned from the tactic which Aston Martin had been deploying is not clear, but the Silverstone based team were having their best qualifying of the season. They too had been sending their cars out while the pit lane and track was mostly clear with the result that the Aston Martin pair.
Normally the best time to put in the fastest one lap time of a qualifying session, is right at the end with the last car over the line having the best of the track conditions in terms of grip. Yet in Hungary, the temperatures began falling after the very first run in Q1.
By the time Q3 began, the track temperature had fallen a massive 15 degrees centigrade which proved to be critical, something Fernando Alonso had recognised requesting the team coach him on his out lap over the core and surface temperatures of his tyres.
Albon says ‘2026 F1 cars will not reward talent’
Aston Martin found the key
The result was Alonso began his final push run with his tyres in optimum condition, which resulted in his highest qualifying result of the season with a P5. As the McLaren’s and others squabbled over the order they would run, Leclerc decided to go early and set a time to avoid any lengthy delay at the end of the pit lane.
This paid dividends as the Ferrari driver pushed hard through sectors one and two, hoping the tyres would hang on to complete the lap. Despite losing a little in sector three, Leclerc’s time was good enough to pip the dominant McLarens to the front box on the grid.
Ferrari’s garage position this season means they are one of the first as the cars come into the pit lane. Whilst this is excellent to avoid chaos during a busy set of pit stop rounds when racing, its a lot further for the red cars to go to get to the front of the line in a qualifying session.
This was something Fred Vasseur noted after the session: “Even if we start [our garage departure] just before the others, we are last [in line],” he said. “Yes, we are fighting with McLaren, but we are still last. So we decided to go much earlier than the others. That was the right call for us.”
Leclerc’s call worth 0.5 seconds
By not queuing in the pit lane, Leclerc was able to better retain the tyre temperature on his out lap which proved to be the key to him snatching pole from the McLaren’s. Leclerc was the only driver to go quicker on their final Q3 run as the track temperature continued to plunge. Fred Vasseur revealed the difference having the correct tyre temperatures made for his driver. “When the tyres are in the right window, it’s worth more than half a second,” he said after the session.
While Aston Martin employed the tactic for the entirety of qualifying, Leclerc’s demand made before his second Q2 run proved to be the crucial schooling the Ferrari strategists needed. With mixed conditions expected for the race, Leclerc’s tenuous lead over the McLaren pair may become more secure than it looks at present.
Meanwhile Hamilton who failed to call for his team mates strategy is starting down in P12. He has the rookies of Isack Hadjar, Liam Lawson and Oliver Bearman directly ahead of him who he must clear quickly, if the race at his most successful circuit is not to be fatally compromised.
Mekies solution to the 2nd Red Bull seat
ed Bull Racing have been heading down the rabbit hole for some time with their Formula One car design. Whilst there’s always been difficulty in finding a driver who can compete with world champion Max Verstappen, the second seat at the Milton Keynes based team this year has become an absolute nightmare.
Last year experienced driver Sergio Perez found the RB20 nigh on impossible to drive after early European season upgrades. The Mexican driver had scored 103 points at the conclusion of round six in Miami, but remarkably managed just 48 more across the final three quarters of the season.
Checo had been awarded a new two year extension to his contract despite again failing to score at the Monaco Grand Prix, but the vote of confidence Red Bull showed in their driver failed to translate into improvements in performance on track…. READ MORE
With over 30 years of experience in Formula 1 as an insider journalist, I have built trusted connections across the paddock, from race engineers and mechanics to senior team figures. At The Judge 13, I and a handful of trusted colleagues share exclusive Formula 1 news, expert analysis and behind-the-scenes stories you will not find in mainstream motorsport media.
