Charles Leclerc pinpoints where Ferrari must improve to close gap on Max Verstappen

Leclerc’s lead at the top of the drivers’ championship standings has narrowed to 19 points

Leclerc has been unable to beat Verstappen when the Dutchman has finished a race (Getty Images)

Charles Leclerc believes that Ferrari must improve their race pace if they are to match Max Verstappen and Red Bull.

The defending world champion secured his third win of the season with an excellent performance at the inaugural Miami Grand Prix, surviving significant pressure from Leclerc in the final ten laps.

Verstappen’s second successive victory cuts the Ferrari driver’s lead at the top of the drivers’ championship standings to 19 points.

Predicting a “long championship” battle between the pair, Leclerc thinks that his team are currently unable to match the pure speed of their title rivals.

The Monegasque believes it is “pretty clear” that work must be done to make improvements and ensure that Ferrari can remain in the title mix.

“It is going to be a long championship,” Leclerc said after finishing second in Miami. “It seems that [Red Bull] had the upper hand for two weekends now, in race pace especially, and we need to take back the advantage as soon as possible.

“I’m disappointed. think we are very strong in terms of tyre warm-up so at the beginning of every race we are strong and also after the Safety Car restart on the hard we were very strong but after four, five laps they seemed to stabilise the tyres in a better window.

“There they are just quicker than us so it’s very difficult to do anything. It’s like this. We need to work on that. It’s pretty clear what’s going on and hopefully we will get better at it as quickly as possible.”

Carlos Sainz, Leclerc’s teammate, finished third in Florida, ahead of Sergio Perez of Red Bull.

Verstappen, who started third on the grid, had appeared to be cruising to victory after climbing into the race lead on lap nine, but an incident between Lando Norris and Pierre Gasly of AlphaTauri caused the introduction of a safety car.

That set up a dramatic ten-lap dash to the finish for the condensed field, but Leclerc was unable to force himself into striking distance for a potential race-winning move.

Ferrari are now just six points ahead of Red Bull in the constructors’ championship standings with the Spanish Grand Prix in Barcelona next on the calendar on Sunday 22 May.