Starting the season with 2 race wins in three races, Charles Leclerc was supposed to be the toughest contender Max Verstappen would face. But owing to reliability issues and strategic mistakes, the Monegasque is stuck in the battle of P2 with the other Red Bull driver, Sergio Perez. Now, although Ferrari is quite happy with Leclerc’s P4 in the Brazilian GP, he seems quite frustrated.

Leclerc had an action-packed Brazilian race. During the race, he made a contact with Mclaren’s Lando Norris but worked his way back to finish at P4. The battle of P2 is getting more intense as the fight for the second spot will be reaching the final race in Abu Dhabi.

Both Charles Leclerc and Sergio Perez are tied on 290 points. To take a lead in the driver’s championship, Leclerc asked on the team radio to instruct teammate Carlos Sainz, who was at P3, to let him pass. The Monegasque wanted to overtake the Spaniard and get those three crucial points.

Sainz, who was almost three seconds ahead of the Monegasque, was not ordered to move aside. This made Leclerc frustrated, and he was found giving some sarcastic replies to the team over the radio.

He said, “Please think about the championship, every point.” Then he got a reply from the team, “We believe it’s too risky. And P4, amazing job.” 

Leclerc asked, “What did you say?”

Then again, the team replied, “Amazing job!” In the end, the Monegasque gave a sarcastic reply, “Yeah, amazing. Yeah, Mama Mia!”

A few moments later the team told the Monegasque that there were reasons why he was not let through by Sainz. To which the 25-year-old replied, “Yep, I don’t know what reason we’re speaking about sorry but uh yeah whatever it’s fine.” 

READ MORE: Furious Charles Leclerc Leaves Explicit Message For Lando Norris As F1 World Reacts to Foolish Brazilian GP Blunder

After the race, Mattia Binotto told the reason why Charles Leclerc was not allowed to pass Carlos Sainz.

Mattia Binotto reveals the reason why Charles Leclerc was not given the P3 position

Ferrari revealed post-race that there were two different scenarios that could have messed up their positions if they had allowed the Monegasque to pass Sainz. The first one was Sainz receiving a 5s time penalty over safety car rule infringement. Moreover, Fernando Alonso and Max Verstappen were chasing down Leclerc. Hence, the Reds could have lost positions to them with the swap.

Analyzing the whole situation, the Prancing Horse decides not to force anything. Concluding the whole scenario, Mattia Binotto said, ” Swapping the two cars on the last straight was certainly tricky because Charles had Fernando and Max just behind. But more than that, we knew that we were under investigation for what happened behind the safety car with Tsunoda.”

The Italian further added, “It would have been risky, because a five-second penalty, for example, would mean that then Carlos would have been losing more than one position. So, for the constructors’ championship, it was certainly better to stick with the positions and the gaps on track.”

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After the thrilling Brazilian GP, the battle of P2 in both WDC and WCC is quite heated. Who do you think can make history in Abu Dhabi?