Charles Leclerc forced to manage “horrible” brake issue for “entire” Bahrain GP

Charles Leclerc has revealed that the brake issue that plagued him in the early phase of the F1 Bahrain Grand Prix affected him for the “entire” 57 laps.

After qualifying second, Leclerc looked set for a strong start to 2024 as he challenged Max Verstappen for the race lead into Turn 1.

Soon after, Leclerc lost out to George Russell before slipping behind Sergio Perez and teammate Carlos Sainz.

Leclerc ran wide, off the track, on six occasions in the opening 10 laps, struggling with lock ups.

It soon transpired that Leclerc had a brake-related issue which hurt his pace.

Reflecting on it, Leclerc said:  “I couldn’t go around Turn 9, 10 for the first ten laps even though I was having crazy brake balance to the rear,” he said. “I would lock every lap and I was making big changes.

“It’s been a very, very frustrating race because I was waiting for this race for a long time. I wanted to show what we were capable of and at the end we cannot show anything on my side because we were completely out of place with brake balance and the car in general wasn’t where I wanted it to be.

“We will have to analyse what went wrong in order to stop all these issues from happening.”

Despite a better second half of the race, where he overtook Russell on track for fourth, the brake issue persisted.

“I was managing the entire time,” he added. “There was no moment where in the first 10 laps it got much worse every lap. That’s why I did so many mistakes. 

“I was always trying to anticipate the brakes but whenever I was the issue was bigger, locking up again.

“After 10 laps it stabilised so at least I knew there was an issue and I knew what to expect but it still felt horrible.”