Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc admitted that he did not defend himself well enough against Oscar Piastri and lost victory in the Azerbaijan Grand Prix to the McLaren driver after a thrilling duel.

Leclerc started from pole position for the fourth time in a row on the streets of Baku, but after the only pit stop sequence of the race, second-placed Piastri made a daring advance into Turn 1 on lap 20 and snatched the lead from the Monegasque.

Leclerc stayed close to the Australian for the rest of the race, using DRS to try and overtake him again on the same corner several times, but when his hard tyres started to wear out, the Ferrari man had to settle for second place.

Leclerc admitted he was surprised by Piastri’s late move at Turn 1. He realised he should have tried to defend himself rather than returning to the racing line early. He felt Piastri was certainly too far back to try anything.

“To be honest, we lost the race because I didn’t defend as well as I should have at the end of the straight,” said Leclerc. “But that’s the way it is. Sometimes you make mistakes and I will learn from them.”

“When Oscar overtook me, I thought, ‘Okay, now it’s just a matter of staying calm, trying to keep the tires alive and overtaking him again later.’

“But actually it was a lot harder and on the straights I couldn’t get as close as I wanted. I think McLaren maybe had a little less downforce, so they were very quick on the straights. In the corners we were a little quicker.”

Charles Leclerc, Scuderia Ferrari, 2nd place, Lando Norris, McLaren F1 Team, congratulates Oscar Piastri, McLaren F1 Team, 1st place, in the Parc Ferme

Photo by: Dom Romney / Motorsport Images

Leclerc initially thought Piastri was “crazy” for pushing so hard in the second stint. The Ferrari driver was forced to use his hard tyres to keep up, which almost cost him second place behind Red Bull’s Sergio Perez.

However, the Red Bull driver was involved in a collision with the second Ferrari of Carlos Sainz on the penultimate lap, meaning Leclerc only finished second with heavily worn tires.

“We were very competitive and the car felt good. Unfortunately, we didn’t run with a lot of fuel in FP1 and FP2 and went for a setup direction that was perhaps a bit more difficult to manage in the race, especially on the hard tyres,” he added.

“I was really struggling to keep the rear tires alive. And towards the end I really thought I was going to hit the wall. It was very close.”