SHANGHAI
\nCharles Leclerc said Thursday he hoped the Chinese year of the horse would bring Ferrari luck in Shanghai after a torrid race there 12 months ago.
\nBoth Ferraris were sensationally disqualified from the 2025 Chinese Grand Prix after the race for \u201cexcessive plank wear\u201d on the undersides of their cars.
\nChina ushered in the new year of the horse last month and Leclerc reckoned that could be a good omen for Ferrari, who famously feature a back prancing horse or \u201cCavallino\u201d on their badges.
\n\u201cI\u2019ve been with the team for many years and I\u2019ve been waiting for the year of the horse since the first year I joined the team,\u201d the driver from Monaco told reporters ahead of this weekend\u2019s Chinese Grand Prix.
\n\u201cI hope that this year is our one, but we are against very tough competition,\u201d added Leclerc, who was third in the season-opener in Australia last weekend.
\nLeclerc and teammate Lewis Hamilton came in behind the two Mercedes of race winner George Russell and Kimi Antonelli.
\n\u201cI think Mercedes are quite a bit ahead at the moment but little by little, I think we can catch them,\u201d said Leclerc.
\nSeven-time world champion Hamilton was a surprise winner of the sprint race at the Shanghai International Circuit last year in an otherwise difficult debut season in an underperforming 2025 Ferrari.
\nHamilton is much happier this season, but cautioned it was still early days.
\nThe Englishman said it was \u201cfar too early\u201d to say if Ferrari could challenge for the drivers\u2019 or constructors\u2019 championships.
\n\u201cI think it will still be very tough to beat Mercedes this weekend,\u201d Hamilton told reporters.
\n\u201cYou have to assume the others will be picking up the pace, McLaren will pick up the pace and the second Red Bull will be in the fight as well.
\n\u201cSo I think we will just focus on doing the best job we can and extracting the most from the car.\u201dBoth Ferraris were sensationally disqualified from the 2025 Chinese GP
\nNews Agency
\nSHANGHAI
\nCharles Leclerc said Thursday he hoped the Chinese year of the horse would bring Ferrari luck in Shanghai after a torrid race there 12 months ago.
\nBoth Ferraris were sensationally disqualified from the 2025 Chinese Grand Prix after the race for \u201cexcessive plank wear\u201d on the undersides of their cars.
\nChina ushered in the new year of the horse last month and Leclerc reckoned that could be a good omen for Ferrari, who famously feature a back prancing horse or \u201cCavallino\u201d on their badges.
\n\u201cI\u2019ve been with the team for many years and I\u2019ve been waiting for the year of the horse since the first year I joined the team,\u201d the driver from Monaco told reporters ahead of this weekend\u2019s Chinese Grand Prix.
\n\u201cI hope that this year is our one, but we are against very tough competition,\u201d added Leclerc, who was third in the season-opener in Australia last weekend.
\nLeclerc and teammate Lewis Hamilton came in behind the two Mercedes of race winner George Russell and Kimi Antonelli.
\n\u201cI think Mercedes are quite a bit ahead at the moment but little by little, I think we can catch them,\u201d said Leclerc.
\nSeven-time world champion Hamilton was a surprise winner of the sprint race at the Shanghai International Circuit last year in an otherwise difficult debut season in an underperforming 2025 Ferrari.
\nHamilton is much happier this season, but cautioned it was still early days.
\nThe Englishman said it was \u201cfar too early\u201d to say if Ferrari could challenge for the drivers\u2019 or constructors\u2019 championships.
\n\u201cI think it will still be very tough to beat Mercedes this weekend,\u201d Hamilton told reporters.
\n\u201cYou have to assume the others will be picking up the pace, McLaren will pick up the pace and the second Red Bull will be in the fight as well.
\n\u201cSo I think we will just focus on doing the best job we can and extracting the most from the car.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SHANGHAI Charles Leclerc said Thursday he hoped the Chinese year of the horse would bring Ferrari luck in Shanghai after a torrid race there 12 months ago. Both Ferraris were sensationally disqualified from the 2025 Chinese Grand Prix after the race for \u201cexcessive plank wear\u201d on the undersides of their cars. China ushered in the …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":95020,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-95038","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95038","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=95038"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95038\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":95050,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95038\/revisions\/95050"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/95020"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=95038"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=95038"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=95038"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}