Charles Leclerc admits that Ferrari Has failed to meet their goals at the beginning of 2025. The SF-25 lags behind the MCL39 by several developmental stages. facing deficiencies in top performance, reliability, and tire management .
In Melbourne, Ferrari managed to secure just 5 points, placing them at an unimpressive 6th position in the rankings.
Even though Scuderia is clearly ranked higher than sixth place in the constructor standings, Their weak plan at Albert Park It was not the sole concerning occurrence from this past weekend.
Concerns about Ferrari continue, requiring enhancements.
Before this weekend’s activities, McLaren were the favourites to establish the benchmark in 2025,
The facility in Woking met those expectations, as Norris secured a win in Australia.
An expensive spin kept Piastri from sharing the podium with him, but The MCL39 remained decidedly the quickest vehicle on the track. .
The McLaren pair built up a lead of 20 seconds over their competitors. Verstappen by Lap 30 in P3, with the field being brought back together solely due to a Safety Car.
Ferrari has been disappointing in nearly every area further down the field.
In the Mercedes, Russell was persistently quicker than Leclerc, whereas Lewis Hamilton found himself trailing for much of the event. Alex Albon .
Clearly, the Scuderia’s subpar strategic decision placed them at the lower spectrum of the point standings, proving to be quite detrimental.
Nevertheless, the truth still stands that McLaren, Mercedes (which includes newcomer Kimi Antonelli), along with Max Verstappen were quicker both in dry and wet conditions.
Ferrari not only had difficulty optimizing their setup during qualifying, but they also experienced less tire wear compared to their competitors during the race.
Although McLaren, Mercedes, and even Red Bull have a clear development path — The situation remains more uncertain for Ferrari.
Leclerc muses over the Australian Grand Prix.
After the race, when addressing the press, Charles Leclerc openly discussed the circumstances.
It's been quite a challenging day all around. However, we'll investigate further since this is just the opening race of the season.
“Yeah, It isn’t the starting race of the season we had envisioned. .
“However, as we move ahead, we must rejuvenate our spirits for Shanghai and bounce back from the letdown of the first weekend.”
When talking about Shanghai, the upcoming Chinese Grand Prix scheduled for next weekend is a key event. another challenge for Ferrari.
Essentially, for this Sprint Race weekend, Ferrari will have just one practice session to ensure the SF-25 is optimized and performs well.
Given the consistent performance demonstrated by McLaren (as well as Mercedes and Verstappen, though somewhat less pronounced), The room for mistake is quite limited at Fred Vasseur’s team. .
When questioned about whether McLaren is ahead of Ferrari, Leclerc provided a straightforward answer.
We certainly are, even if you take a look. The speed of McLaren today was astonishing. .
“Even much more strong than yesterday, by example. We’ve got to look into it, but we are on the back foot.
“It’s only race 1 out of 24. There are many other races where we have to stay calm and keep working in the right direction.”
Vasseur optimistic, but question marks remain
When Ferrari’s development stagnated last season in Spain, Fred Vasseur insisted that corrections were incoming.
The team boss at Maranello was adamant that his engineering staff comprehended the issues and possessed viable solutions.
By 2025, at this point, however, It remains uncertain whether Ferrari knows which direction to take moving forward. .
Several choices made by the Scuderia during the off-season, such as their front suspension design, have not yet produced the expected results.
Nevertheless, Fred Vasseur maintains that the speed is present – however, Ferrari needs to make sure they harness it effectively.
As for the positive aspects from the weekend, we demonstrated good speed on Friday during both the qualifying and race setups.
“ Aligning with Mercedes and Red Bull, but slightly trailing McLaren. .
"It’s also great that in a few days we’ll get back on track, which means that very soon we will have another chance to assess our capabilities .
It's quite an extensive season, and we simply need to keep working diligently.
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