Leclerc finally a prophet in his own land
He's done it. Charles' Monaco jinx is finally broken. And he did it in commanding style, proving to be the quickest on track from the first lap of Friday free practice to the last of the Grand Prix on Sunday. He led from start to finish today, without making the slightest error, cleverly managing the tyres with each passing lap. This win has wiped away the nightmare memories of 2021 and 2022 and his lifetime's dream has been realised.
In fact, it was the last two laps that Charles found the most challenging, when he was overcome with emotion, tears in his eyes compromising his visibility at the exit to the tunnel. He found the right words to express those emotions, remembering his father Hervé, who had helped him all through his career ultimately leading to Formula 1 in the hope of seeing his son win on these streets. Charles also spoke of his friend Jules Bianchi, who had first taken him to the kart track at Brignoles, a few kilometres from Monaco, as well as being with Charles on his first visit to Maranello and introducing him to another key figure in his career, Nicolas Todt, who would become his manager. Sadly, both the father and Bianchi tragically died without seeing Charles reach the heights of the blue riband category of motor racing.
It's the most important Formula 1 win of Leclerc's career to date, even more so than the first one, at Spa in 2019 on that sad weekend, when his friend Anthoine Hubert died in the Formula 2 race, or the second, at Monza a week later. Charles went on to win three more times, in Bahrain, Australia and Austria in 2022, since when he has faced his demons, both inside and outside the team and now he faces the prospect of being partnered next year with the most successful driver of all time, namely Lewis Hamilton. That won't be easy to deal with and he will want to go into next year as the team leader. In order to be regarded as such you need to be a winner and so it must have been hard for him to see that, until today, the only Ferrari driver who had managed to derail the Red Bull express train was Carlos Sainz.
Tonight, there'll be a well deserved party in the paddock and elsewhere and once the hangover has subsided, a new chapter in Charles' career will begin. Not so much because the win opens up the possibility that Max Verstappen might not run away with the championship title once again, because the Dutchman must still be favourite, nor that the Constructors' championship looks far more open than before, but mainly because it's the moment for him to mark his territory, to show that he is the real leader of Ferrari under Fred Vasseur. That way, Hamilton will have to find his own space in Maranello in 2025.
