Vasseur to meet Hamilton and Leclerc after the Ferrari fight Verstappen won

Fred Vasseur has already spoken separately to Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc about the opening lap of the Mexico City Grand Prix. The Ferrari team principal plans to bring them together in São Paulo on Friday, 6 November, according to The Race. Two questions hang over that meeting. How hard can the Ferrari drivers race each other with a rival on their tail? And who makes the call to give a place back when doing so would also hand the lead to another team?

The corner that put Verstappen between the Ferraris
Why Leclerc kept the lead
Hamilton sees parallels with Vettel and Sainz
Eight seasons and nine wins for Leclerc
Sainz remembers the phone calls after the race
Why the fans were harder for Sainz to deal with

The corner that put Verstappen between the Ferraris

Hamilton started from pole in Mexico and held off Leclerc through the opening sequence. Leclerc tried again around the outside at Turn 4, where both drivers ran wide. Hamilton turned back towards the track while Leclerc cut across the grass and emerged in the lead. As Hamilton tried to get back up to speed, Max Verstappen slipped past him. Seconds earlier, the two Ferraris had been fighting for first place. Now there was a Red Bull between them.

Leclerc kept the lead but received a five-second penalty for gaining an advantage off the track. Verstappen took over at the front when Leclerc served it at his pit stop and went on to win. Hamilton finished second and Leclerc fourth. In Hamilton’s view, Ferrari had the pace for a one-two.

Why Leclerc kept the lead

Leclerc accepted that he deserved the penalty. From the cockpit, though, the choice was more complicated. With Verstappen up to second, giving the place back to Hamilton would mean letting the Red Bull take the lead as well. Leclerc asked over the radio what he should do and stayed ahead. He saw the fight itself as fair game with a win at stake. He also pointed to Turn 1, where he felt Hamilton had pushed him wide.

For Vasseur, the difficulty was that Ferrari had already agreed how to handle just such a situation. Leclerc wanted a clearer instruction from the pit wall. Vasseur said the drivers had agreed before the start that it was up to them to give a place back before Turn 11. By the time the engineers could consult race control and review the pictures, which reached them several seconds behind the action, that opportunity had effectively passed.

Hamilton sees parallels with Vettel and Sainz

Asked in Brazil on Thursday whether Leclerc raced him harder than he raced other drivers, Hamilton said yes. He pointed to the start in Singapore, where Leclerc had drawn alongside Verstappen on the inside but backed out. Hamilton said he had seen Leclerc fight his previous Ferrari team-mates, Sebastian Vettel and Carlos Sainz, in much the same way he now fights him.

“I’m never going to be silenced,” Hamilton said, standing by his comments after Mexico. He was prepared to take responsibility for his own decisions, but doubted a single meeting would settle everything.

Eight seasons and nine wins for Leclerc

Asked in São Paulo about joining a team where his team-mate has spent eight seasons and won nine grands prix, Hamilton recalled arriving at Maranello. “He’s very much embedded within the team, and I knew that it would always be a challenge,” he said of Leclerc.

“I’ve really worked hard to build a good relationship with Charles,” Hamilton added. He acknowledged that the adjustment worked both ways. Ferrari had taken on a driver who speaks his mind and keeps asking for changes. He gave one example of where that leads behind the scenes. He is already working with the heads of aerodynamics and vehicle dynamics to decide which strengths of this year’s car to carry into the next.

Sainz remembers the phone calls after the race

Hamilton cited Carlos Sainz as an example, but the Spaniard also remembers the conversations the public never heard during his four seasons alongside Leclerc, from 2021 to 2024. Back in September, after the current Ferrari pair clashed at Monza, he explained how he and Charles defused their own rows.

“Two or three times a year me and Charles always had a bit of a discussion or an argument, but after the race or the morning after we would call each other and sort it out among each other. I think it’s normal when you’re fighting for podiums or wins,” Sainz said.

Why the fans were harder for Sainz to deal with

In São Paulo on Thursday, this time speaking in the wake of Mexico, Sainz recalled his battles with Leclerc at Monza and Las Vegas. In Ferrari’s home race in 2023, they fought over the final podium place right into the last lap. Sainz held on to third. As he remembers it, the late attacks and hard defending went hand in hand with respect on both sides.

“I think what was more difficult was the fan base. It was very polarised between Charles and me,” Sainz said. He remembered some of Leclerc’s most ardent supporters “insulting or wishing me bad”. Some Italian outlets, he added, felt he was “not being enough of a number two”. When it was Leclerc’s turn to give way, criticism could just as easily go the other way.

That is where the distinction between those phone calls and Vasseur’s meeting matters. Sainz and Leclerc could talk the next morning about why one of them had gone for a move. In Mexico, Ferrari had seconds to decide whether one driver should yield, with Verstappen already between them. It is for that moment that Hamilton wants an understanding in advance.

For Vasseur, there is also the question of respect for the people in Maranello who worked through the night on upgrades. They saw their car take pole in Mexico, only to watch Verstappen profit from a fight between their own drivers the next day. That gives Friday’s discussion a practical purpose. The next time the two Ferraris reach the first corner side by side, both drivers need to know how much room they are expected to leave each other and when the pit wall will step in.

Sources · The Race · Reuters · Formula 1 – Leclerc · Formula 1 – Vasseur · Formula 1 – race report · PlanetF1 · Crash.net · Motorsport.com Brasil