Charles Leclerc furious at the '2-second coverage' misrepresenting friction between him and Ferrari teammate

Charles Leclerc touched upon the recent media misinterpretation between him and his Ferrari teammate Carlos Sainz following the 2024 Mexico City Grand Prix qualifying. Leclerc stated that people saw a "two-second" footage and passed judgment, which infuriated him.

Ferrari had a satisfactory qualifying at Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez, where Sainz claimed the pole position and Leclerc qualified in P4. However, they had a better outing on Sunday when two drivers stood on the podium as Sainz claimed the victory, and Leclerc rounded up the last podium place.

While the two Prancing Horse stars brought a good 40 points for the team, Leclerc was not too happy with the outcome. The Monegasque driver was running in P2 but lost the position to McLaren's Lando Norris.

Following the conclusion, Charles Leclerc took his helmet off and walked past his teammate Sainz, without congratulating him for the win. This led fans to speculate that there were tensions between the Ferrari duo, which Leclerc snubbed recently.

"I'm very angry with what I've seen everywhere. People judge on two seconds of coverage," Leclerc told Sky Germany. "Actually before that I went to see Carlos and there was no tension."

Furthermore, it was observed during the race that Sainz brought the team's attention to their pace. The Spanish driver said on the radio that they were pushing too hard, which was unnecessary at that point.

Interestingly, the team did not inform about this to Leclerc, but the message was broadcast on live television. This comes the very next race week after Leclerc swore on the radio during Mexico City GP qualifying after a poor final flying lap.

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Unhappy Charles Leclerc shared thoughts on poor Brazilian GP

Charles Leclerc of Monaco and Ferrari and Lewis Hamilton of Great Britain and Mercedes at the F1 Grand Prix of Brazil and Qualifying - Source: Getty Images

Ferrari had an underwhelming outing in the 2024 Sao Paulo Grand Prix where Charles Leclerc came home in P5, and his teammate had a DNF. The treacherous conditions at the Interlagos hindered the SF-24's performance, something Leclerc opened up about in one of the post-race interviews.

"With the new tyres, low fuel, you can extract more out of the car, but in the race, we were nowhere – and more than being nowhere, it was extremely difficult to drive, extremely difficult to not do any mistakes," Leclerc stated.

"At the end, looking at all this, the only thing we could be a little bit satisfied of is being in front of the two McLarens and to only lose four points in the constructors is big damage limitation on the weekend where they seem to be so strong."

McLaren leads the Constructors' Championship with 593 points, followed by Ferrari with 557 points. Red Bull sits in P3 with 544 points.