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F1 pundit Ralf Schumacher believes Lewis Hamilton initiated some ‘mind games’ with Charles Leclerc following the Monegasque driver’s crash during qualifying at the Barcelona Grand Prix.
For the second race weekend in a row, Charles Leclerc ended qualifying with a totalled Ferrari SF-26, after a snap of oversteer at turn four corrected the 28-year-old into the gravel and among the barriers at Barcelona.
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Leclerc detailed how ‘ashamed’ he was of his error in the media pen following his return to the F1 paddock, with fans sharing their opinion that his crash-prone nature strongly suggests that he will never be a world champion in the sport.
To make matters worse for Leclerc’s confidence, Ferrari teammate Lewis Hamilton went on to secure the Scuderia’s first win of 2026, as well as his first win for the Maranello-based outfit.
However, the victory apparently came after the 41-year-old began ‘mind games’ with his Ferrari counterpart, according to former F1 driver Ralf Schumacher.
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Ralf Schumacher on Lewis Hamilton’s ‘mind games’ with Charles Leclerc in Barcelona
Speaking via the Backstage Boxengasse podcast, Schumacher began by urging Leclerc to be careful from now on, due to his opinion that the seven-time world champion is now showing him up on race weekends.
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The Barcelona Grand Prix marked the fourth consecutive round of racing that Hamilton has beaten him, and the third that the Briton has out-qualified him.
“Well, Charles needs to be careful now, because he’s letting Lewis show him up a bit at the moment,” the six-time Grand Prix winner said, before alluding to Hamilton’s mind games with, “And Lewis has already started playing mind games at the press conference.
“He said, ‘I went into that corner a bit faster.’ I think Charles wanted to copy him there and ended up spinning the car out in qualifying.
“As a driver, there are always certain spots where you just let it go and say, ‘OK, I can squeeze out another tenth or two in qualifying and be faster than my team-mate.’ I think that’s what Charles had in mind; that’s what he wanted to do.
“But he overestimated himself and went into the corner far too fast, by nearly 10 km/h, or nine to be precise, I think. He needs to stop now. He simply needs to take a step back and draw on what he’s capable of.”
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Schumacher is also adamant that Leclerc is still the faster driver out of the two stars in Ferrari’s line-up, but theorised that the Monegasque driver is simply suffering from low confidence, which has attributed to his disappointing form.
“I reckon that, in terms of speed, Charles Leclerc is still better than him,” he added. “He just needs to ease off a bit now and not overdrive the car.
“He mustn’t panic just because Lewis Hamilton is ahead, I’ve always said it would take a while. At one point, it really did look as though he was giving up, because he was so far off the pace.”
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