Damon Hill says 26-year-old driver ‘had a mare’ during Bahrain Grand Prix

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Damon Hill praised the qualifying pace of Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc but suggested he had a ‘mare of a race’ on Saturday in Bahrain.

The 26-year-old was sensational on Friday and should have been on pole position had he hooked up his best lap in Q3.

Speaking on the F1 Nation Podcast, Hill praised his speed but admitted things could have gone a lot better when it counted on race day.

Hill says Leclerc had a mare in Bahrain

Charles Leclerc has regularly been called the fastest driver on the grid in qualifying.

Last year, Martin Brundle suggested he was even better than three-time world champion Max Verstappen over one lap.

However, he’s got a really poor record of converting his pole positions into race wins, although admittedly he’s been up against a Red Bull that’s proved to be unstoppable over long runs.

He should have started the season with another first place start, however, his best lap came too soon to count towards the final grid.

Things got a lot worse for Leclerc in Bahrain and Hill suggested he had a mare as his car quickly let him down.

His brakes weren’t working properly making racing against the Red Bulls and his own teammate very difficult.

Reliability once again costs Leclerc

Speaking about Saturday’s race, Hill said: “Well, I think I was a little bit surprised [by Red Bull’s dominance]. I mean when I saw the testing, I thought Red Bull were going to be dominant.

“Then people closed up and it did look like it was going to be quite tight.

“Qualifying was reasonably close, in actual fact an odd thing happened. Max [Verstappen] was on pole position even though he wasn’t the fastest in qualifying which was Charles Leclerc which was in Q2 not in Q3 when it counts.

“In the hour of qualifying, the quickest car was actually Charles Leclerc, but he had a mare of a race.”

Hill’s right to suggest that Leclerc had a mare in Bahrain but once again there were factors outside of his control.

Ferrari have a very fast car and should be able to open up a gap over Mercedes and McLaren in the opening races before upgrades start to play their part.

However, if the car isn’t working at 100% capacity, then their rivals will start to close the gap and Red Bull will take full advantage.

Carlos Sainz currently has the upper hand over his teammate after the first weekend and Leclerc will be desperate to reverse that considering he’s the driver the team backed to partner Lewis Hamilton next year.