Charles Leclerc started the Spanish Grand Prix on the hard tyre, allowing him to drive a long first stint and make up many positions, as the men in front of him would automatically have to go in for a pit stop. Remarkably, however, the Ferrari driver went in very quickly himself. Christijan Albers understands very little of that choice and considers both Leclerc and the Italian formation's strategists guilty.

The former Formula One driver could not believe his eyes when he saw Leclerc looking for the pit lane early on before his first stop. "I really thought what is happening here? The problem was that Charles felt he was slow, that he had little grip. But his lap times were perfect. There was nothing wrong with that. He was driving through the field. Then he kept pushing, kept moaning, kept hammering at the team and they brought him in from poverty at one point because they were going crazy with the whining, I think."

Leclerc 'a bit confused'

Leclerc felt that things went a lot better on softs afterwards, but the data showed that was not the case. The first stint would have been much better than the second stint. Albers therefore draws a harsh conclusion about the Monegasque's weekend. "He was a bit confused this weekend. Whatever qualifying beast it [is], it didn't work, it didn't go. An off-weekend just like that."

So the current world championship number seven's call was incorrect, but Albers, as a former driver, knows that sometimes things feel different that they really are. He therefore also looks at Ferrari's pit wall. "They should pass him [the correct times] and they should give him that confidence: listen Charles you are just driving good times," Albers said in De Telegraaf's F1 podcast. "He changed even earlier than Lewis on his soft tyres. Unbelievable. Completely wasted that race."

Ferrari falls further behind

Leclerc finished 11th in Spain, just outside the points. Carlos Sainz did finish in the top-ten. Thanks to his fifth-place finish, Ferrari picked up ten points for the constructors' world championship. However, rivals Red Bull, Mercedes and Aston Martin all took more points and so, as in Monaco a week earlier, it was a mediocre weekend.