F1: The Child-Faced Killer: Charles Leclerc, the Hamilton-style leader against whom Carlos Sainz must fight

The Madrid player will measure strength against the Ferrari leader, who showed Vettel an ambition similar to that of the British against Alonso.

On September 1, 2018, shortly after the qualifying session for the Italian GP, Charles Leclerc I received a call that was going to change his life. On the other side of the phone, Maurizio Arrivabene, boss of Ferrari, confirmed him as the official driver for the 2019 World Cup in replacement of Kimi raikkonen. At just 20 years old, the Monegasque became the youngest driver since Ricardo Rodrguez (1961) to take the wheel of the mythical red blidos.

Two weeks later, during the press conference at the Singapore GP, a journalist asked Leclerc if he intended to settle for the secondary role that Raikkonen had so punctually fulfilled in favor of Sebastian Vettel. “No. I think they will let us compete on an equal footing from the start of the championship,” Leclerc replied, before the same question was transferred to the German. “He is a good boy and he will integrate well. Everybody will want to help him,” said the world champion.

Well, a year and a half after that appearance in Marina Bay, the “good boy” is the leader of Ferrari, while Vettel, stripped of his seat in favor of Carlos Sainz, heads hopelessly towards withdrawal.

Fearsome at a turn

At the time of Arrivabene's famous call, Leclerc's baggage was down to 14 races behind the wheel of a Sauber and a sixth place finish in Bak as a highlight. Logic, therefore, aimed at Vettel destroying him in the same way as Fernando Alonso had done with Stoffel Vandoorne at McLaren. However, he himself showed very early that he was not going to resign himself to being a simple gregarious man.

The pole position at the Bahrain GP, ​​only cut short on Sunday by a mechanical failure, put everyone on notice. One-lap speed, one of its main strengths, was particularly bright during Q3 of the Singapore GP. The seven 'poles', World Cup record ahead of Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen, they recorded their innate ability to push the car beyond the limit.

The typhus They soon sponsored their new idol, the third Monegasque, as an Italian. Louis Chiron and Olivier Beretta, in competing in the Great Circus. The peak of the season came at the Italian GP, ​​with a memorable defense against the Mercedes, from the start to the goal. Monza rose on lap 23 before his duel with Hamilton, at the limit of the regulation, in the chicane of Roggia. It was the first home win for a Ferrari driver since Alonso in 2010.

Cold and calculator

It was a test of character for his temperament, cold and calculating even in the most extreme circumstances. Reluctant to receive too much information on the radio, Leclerc attended an accelerated master in Austria, Silverstone and Monza on how to beat copper with Verstappen and Hamilton. And left for the records an overtaking of Vettel in Bahrain as a metaphor for the changing of the guard at Ferrari.

Leclerc's true impact in 2019 was not his consistency – despite two wins and 10 podiums – but his irresistible ambition to storm number one in Maranello. An indomitable spirit similar to that shown by Hamilton in 2007 against Alonso at McLaren. A nonconformity that hatched with all crudeness in Sochi or Interlagos, the scene of the ugliest rifirrafes with Vettel.

Since its renewal in December, signed until 2024, everyone at Ferrari assumed who now takes command. So Sainz must adapt to this reality. Because Leclerc, with that face of never having broken a plate, has long ceased to be the child who went out to his balcony in Monte Carlo to greet Alonso's deeds. His only obsession, as he swore a thousand times to his friend Jules Bianchi, is to be number 1.