F1 News: Charles Leclerc Opens Up On Austin GP Struggles - "In Pain"
Scuderia Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc revealed a difficult weekend in Austin where he was pushed to take painkillers. Not only that, he also faced challenges with his SF-23 F1 car that led to his disqualification from the race.
Leclerc battled an intense toothache through the United States Grand Prix weekend, despite looking on form during qualifying where he went on to take pole position. For Sunday's Grand Prix, Leclerc was the only driver on the grid to opt for the one-stop strategy.
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While that got him a P6 on Sunday, all his efforts went in vain after a post-race investigation conducted on his car by the FIA that got him disqualified from the race due to excessive wear on the car's rear skid blocks.
The governing body selected four cars randomly for the post-race inspection. Leclerc's Ferrari and Lewis Hamilton's W14 were two out of the four cars that were found to violate the skid block rules for having excessive wear on them. As a result, the findings suggested that more of the cars on the grid had a chance of having excessive wear on the skid block.
Fortunately, being on painkillers prevented the toothache from interfering with Leclerc's performance. He told RacingNews365.com:
“I [was] on really big painkillers since Thursday.
"For some reason it was actually quite fine because I took the painkillers before the race.
"I've had times that were more intense so the wish was less but nothing that affected me inside the car, so it's fine. I had like a tooth infection inside, which I think is the wisdom tooth.
"I was quite a lot in pain on Thursday and Friday, then it calmed down. [During the race] it was OK.”
As usual, the race ended with championship leader Max Verstappen claiming victory in Austin. However this time, Hamilton had closed the gap with the Dutchman to just 2.223 seconds on the chequered flag, thus indicating that Mercedes's upgrades are indeed working in the team's favor.
