During Sunday’s Chinese Grand Prix Formula 1 fans heard Ferrari tell Charles Leclerc to speed up and then, just 45 seconds later, that he had to let his team mate past.

On the face of it Ferrari hadn’t given Leclerc much time to prove he was quick enough to pull away from Vettel. However the true circumstances were somewhat different.

While Lewis Hamilton led the two Mercedes away at the front of the field, Vettel was convinced he lap as quickly as them if he could get past his team mate. “How fast can you go? Need to push now,” his race engineer urged. “I’ll try and get closer,” Vettel replied.”I think I can do Hamilton’s pace.”

By lap nine Leclerc was three seconds behind Valtteri Bottas, who in turn was 3.3 seconds adrift of Hamilton. Last year Ferrari had been stung by Bottas, who took the lead from Vettel by pitting before him when he had been 3.5 seconds behind. Their chance to get revenge on the Mercedes was slipping away.

Ferrari’s initial instruction for Leclerc to increase his pace came earlier than was indicated by the delayed radio messages play on the world feed. Leclerc in fact had more than a full 90-second lap to demonstrate his pace:

9 To Leclerc Charles, Can you go faster? Can you go faster? Lap 9, approaching turn six 9 Leclerc [Unclear] …yet. 9 To Leclerc So we need to push. Push now. Exiting turn six 9 To Leclerc We need to go faster otherwise we’ll let Sebastian past. On back straight 9 Leclerc Yeah but we are both… OK. Let’s see in two laps. But OK. 9 To Leclerc Copy

Leclerc’s comment that they would “see in two laps” suggests he was referring to the previous race, where he was told to wait two laps after he said Vettel was holding him up.

Once he had been told to push, Leclerc was slightly quicker in the middle sector, then Vettel took time out of him in the next two. The gap between the pair dipped below 0.7 seconds at one point during lap 10.

Lap Sector Leclerc Vettel 2 29.486 29.562 3 43.167 43.066 1 26.373 26.241 2 29.393 29.625

Through the twisty middle sector Leclerc began to re-establish himself, but in the final sector the team told him he had to let Vettel by.

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9 To Leclerc Charles, Can you go faster? Can you go faster? Lap 9, approaching turn six 10 To Leclerc Let Sebastian by. On back straight 10 Leclerc But I’ve done it now. I’m pulling away. 10 Leclerc I’ll let him by Pit straight 11 To Leclerc Copy

Was Vettel genuinely quicker than Leclerc? Their sector times can be read in different ways.

Vettel’s quicker sector times appear to indicate he was faster, and his time loss in the twisty in sector two was because he was so close to his team mate he was suffering the effects of turbulence. Alternatively, Vettel’s slower sector two time at the end may prove Leclerc was capable of running at his team mate’s pace, and that Vettel was only closing on him thanks to the DRS zones in the other two sectors.

What happened next indicates the latter scenario is realistic. Because not only did Vettel not lap at Hamilton’s pace (he was around a second slower), he was barely any quicker than Leclerc. It looked very much as though the pair had very similar pace, and the DRS effect was making the biggest difference:

By dropping Leclerc behind Vettel, the team had cost their driver almost two seconds, and now he was the one who felt he was being held up. “I’m losing quite a lot of time,” he said on the radio, adding pointedly: “I don’t know whether you want to know or not.” In fact the pace of both cars dropped by around half a second.

For Leclerc the damage was done. The position swap was a triple-whammy: he lost any chance of being able to jump ahead of Bottas, he lost first call on pitting to Vettel, and he lost time compared to Max Verstappen. Red Bull snookered Ferrari by bringing their driver in before either of them, guaranteeing Leclerc would end up behind Verstappen.

There’s little indication Vettel was significantly faster than Leclerc. The time lost swapping their drivers meant Ferrari finished third and fifth instead of third and fourth.

Leclerc had plenty of reason to feel hard done by. Particularly as this was the third time in as many races Ferrari showed his interests come second to his team mate’s.

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2019 F1 season