Charles Leclerc gave a 'heart attack' to his engineers during last lap of the 2022 F1 Bahrain Grand Prix

Charles Leclerc has revealed that he almost gave his engineers a “heart attack” on the last lap of the 2022 Bahrain Grand Prix.

The Ferrari driver said he jokingly told his engineers that something was wrong with his engine, referencing his 2019 heartbreak on the same circuit when he lost the win due to engine problems. Speaking to the media post-race, he said:

“I did a bit of a joke on the radio in the last lap saying, ‘there was something strange with the engine’, which gave a heart attack to some of the engineers I’m sure, but everything was fine. So yeah, very happy that this time we bring we brought it home.”

In 2019, when Ferrari started the season off strong, Charles Leclerc was on course to take his maiden win in Bahrain before power unit reliability issues caused him to drop to P3.

Charles Leclerc led every lap of the 2022 season opener to give Ferrari a dream start to the season. The Monegasque said Ferrari, however, was anxious throughout the race about the car’s reliability and the engineers breathed a sigh of relief as he crossed the line in P1.

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Charles Leclerc relished his battle with old rival Max Verstappen

Charles Leclerc says he relished the “clean battle” for the race lead with old rival Max Verstappen in Bahrain.

Leclerc praised the new generation of cars, saying they allowed him and Verstappen to race hard without experiencing any weird loss in downforce. Speaking in a post-race interview, he said:

“It was tricky, but it was nice though. It was on the limits, hard racing. But we always gave each other space which was nice and following him into turn two was a bit more predictable than what I expected from or what I had last year. So, this this was good, but it was always very close. I will always braked very early into turn one to get the DRS and it worked out three times in a row so then I could keep my lead.”

The 2022 cars are a radical departure compared to the previous generation of F1 cars, especially ones from the last decade. The new regulations were deliberately designed to improve the cars’ ability to follow each other more closely without losing downforce, and thereby downforce.

Many were skeptical of the effects of the new regulations, but so far, the signs have been extremely positive. In Bahrain, racing throughout the field was extremely close and massively entertaining.