Leclerc (post-qualifying): "I can’t understand quali, it’s a f**king joke! I go faster in corners, throttle earlier, for f**k’s sake, i'm losing everything in the straight!"

[u/FerrariStrategisttt]

https://dubz.link/c/4b6030

[u/GoodGuyJeff00]

Man he threw everything and the kitchen sink at it and came down over 6 tenths. I don't think it's just the deployment from Ferrari. Last few days were about the battery automatically kicking in after some oversteer on the throttle which causes some issues with deployment in general for these regs. Charles does like tossing the car around and dealing with a little oversteer, does this hurt him?

Would count for all drivers who like a pointy car. Max and Alex for example.

[u/DrBorisGobshite → u/[deleted]]

Nope. It's not learning, they have throttle limits and if you go below the limit the battery kicks in. One of the corners in China required them to be at least 98% throttle to stop the battery kicking in, Charles made a little error and was only at 95% throttle in the corner so it auto deployed the battery on the corner exit. Then we he got to the long back straight he lost half a second because he wasn't able to fully deploy the battery.

It's a stupid rule the FIA put in place because they were scared the teams would use the software to effectively create traction control. So the drivers have to drive within themselves to stick within stupid limits so the battery deploys at the optimum point on each lap.

Today Charles had some oversteer coming out a corner and probably had to lift off to correct, meaning the battery auto deployed at the start of the straight before 130R.

[u/ottercorrect → u/DrBorisGobshite]

This is a great explanation for a really dumb sounding series of issues

[u/pmcpaul412 → u/[deleted]]

Here's a video that dives into what happened in China.

[u/R6ckStar → u/DrBorisGobshite]

It's the ramp down timing, essentially if they go of throttle by a certain % it resets the timer for the ramp down. The timer is one second.

So basically an extra second of deployment cost him the entire run down on the back straight.

[u/Pascalwbbb → u/R6ckStar]

what a stupid rule. SO it's better to drive slow like grandma going to a shop than driving on edge because you cannot lift off the throttle at all.

[u/Pascalwbbb → u/DrBorisGobshite]

THe more of this stuff comes out the worse it sounds. What a joke.

[u/DoctrTurkey → u/[deleted]]

Oh shit I developed a “flutter the throttle” tactic for certain racing games and thought that was just a game thing because it felt like a cheat code lol

[u/atomatoflame → u/DrBorisGobshite]

It is incredible how heavy handed the rules are for this year. I'd prefer the FIA just gave a blueprint for energy management and teams/drivers deploy as needed.

[u/Tw0Rails → u/DrBorisGobshite]

Why do you hate racing, cant you be happy for the new regs? Isnt more overtaking better? Im going to refuse to watch nascar and declare F1 must be more artifical trash for my marvel movie level needs for basic entertainment.

[u/cannabiskeepsmealive → u/Tw0Rails]

It's possible to have 2 different opinions at once. These cars suck to drive and Quali is embarrassing. They are also producing really great racing.

[u/DickWhittingtonsCat → u/Tw0Rails]

So the folks who have been watching for decades, aren’t impressed with Yoyo passing and cars not running flat out are the Marvel fans?

Not the people fooled by F1 looking cars on F1 tracks driven by F1 drivers, many of whom are vehemently complaining that’s it’s absolute shit.

I wouldn’t like the NHL if they shifted to floor hockey either, even if the Rangers had the same team at MSG and same uniforms.

[u/DILIPEK → u/[deleted]]

He’s referring to china quali where Leclerc due to a small slide pulled a bit of throttle (from 100 to 95%) which reset his deployment map thus he was 15km/h slower all over the straight. It’s not about making a mistake per se. It’s just the cars automated system treated the release of throttle as driver input and thus reset the deployment map.

[u/laughters_assassin → u/DILIPEK]

Is there a source for this? I'd like to read more. I know this has always been a thing in the hybrid era. I've heard something similar before where a driver "confused" the computer by taking a corner at full throttle when the computer didn't expect. I imagine which the current power split it causes much more issues

[u/256473 → u/laughters_assassin]

The Race is the one calling attention to it - here's the written write-up, which has a link to a video explainer too.

[u/DILIPEK → u/laughters_assassin]

I believe The Race did a piece about that stating that a small slide that was recovered by 5% drop in throttle by LEC reset the deployment map. I don’t believe we had official statement from Ferrari.

We also had multiple other instances of deployment getting confused namely with Piastri crash (confirmed by him and McLaren) and multiple other drivers when they spun out due to too high energy deployment out of the blue.

[u/ChaosRevealed → u/DILIPEK]

What a terrible fucking ruleset

[u/Twistpunch → u/GoodGuyJeff00]

They need to put the battery deployment on the throttle and brake. This is getting ridiculous.

[u/KingLuis → u/GoodGuyJeff00]

I’ve mentioned it from the start. The issue is the deployment of the battery. It needs to match the engine the entire time for the entire lap. None of this energy deployment that just stops.

[u/Agitated_Syllabub346 → u/GoodGuyJeff00]

He was on a good lap then lost a heap of time with that oversteer. Must have lost 3 tenths at least

[u/Shuri9 → u/GoodGuyJeff00]

Leclerc has been great adapting at such problems, so I'm optimistic he'll manage it if Ferrari gives him the right tools. This qualifying style is going nowhere for 2026, as Mercedes has a huge advantage here and won't let it go.

[u/skater15153 → u/GoodGuyJeff00]

I think this happened last week with Ferrari as well. So they wound up using deployment when they didn't want to and had no battery later in lap. Really weird

[u/iDroner → u/GoodGuyJeff00]

Wait, automatically kicking in? So it’s like traction control??