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Charles Leclerc emerged triumphant at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit on Sunday, having secured his and Ferrari's first podium of the 2025 season. Leclerc finished behind race winner Oscar Piastri and runner-up Max Verstappen to take a third-place finish at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.
Speaking after the race, the Monegasque driver outlined that he was never expecting such a strong result, admitting that his assumption was that he would be spending time defending his fourth-place start from the cars behind him.
The Ferrari driver also opened up about yesterday's qualifying, specifically believing that he had maxed out the potential of the car, but was thrilled by the result that came out of the race nonetheless.
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"In Qualifying we don't manage to extract more out the car. But I'm very happy with the race, we maximised everything. I never expected to finish [P3], I thought this race was about defending from the cars behind like Kimi [Antonelli]," he said after the race (as per Junaid Samodien on X)
However, Charles Leclerc believes that there's more work to be done with the SF-25, explaining that they do need to be pushing more.
"We need to keep pushing and hopefully upgrades are coming soon." [via Junaid Samodien on X]
After starting from fourth on the grid, Leclerc began his race on medium tyres, which allowed him to stay out till lap 30 before he pitted for hards, which was later than the rest of the front-runners.
Eight laps later, Leclerc caught up with the Mercedes of George Russell, overtaking him and provisionally locking in his podium finish. While he was under threat from Lando Norris towards the end of the race, with the McLaren driver attempting to steal the third-place finish, the Monegasque driver was able to hold his own and secure the maiden podium finish for the team.
Charles Leclerc's third-place finish saw him take home 15 points, while his teammate, Lewis Hamilton, crossed the line to take seventh place, with the two drivers giving Ferrari a total of 21 points in their battle for the constructors' championship.
Ferrari shares a video celebrating Charles Leclerc's podium
Wasting no time after the race, Ferrari took to their social media to share a short video featuring Charles Leclerc, adding a caption that expressed the Italian team's excitement for their first podium of the season. Sharing the video to their Instagram account, which shows Leclerc suiting up in his racing outfit, the team captioned it:
"LET’S GOOO @charles_leclerc!! He picks up his first podium of the year!! 👏🏆"
This was Charles Leclerc's first podium since his third-place finish at the 2024 season finale in Abu Dhabi.
F1 now goes on a break, with the next Grand Prix in Miami taking place from May 2 to 4.
