Ferrari’s upgrades at the Austrian Grand Prix were a step in the right direction, but how big a step, Charles Leclerc says the team need time to find out.

What he does know is that the SF-25 still does not have the “pure pace” to challenge the McLaren.

Ferrari still ‘need more’ to challenge McLaren

Ferrari delivered one of its best results of the season in a three-four finish at the Austrian Grand Prix where Leclerc was back on the podium ahead of Lewis Hamilton.

The Monegasque driver qualified second for his first front row start since Monaco, but was immediately overtaken by Oscar Piastri as the McLaren team-mates, led by Lando Norris, scampered off into the distance.

McLaren clinched the one-two by almost 20 seconds ahead of Leclerc, who led home Hamilton, with George Russell in the Mercedes a distant fifth.

The cornerstone of Ferrari’s performance was the SF-25’s upgraded floor, the first major car upgrade since the Bahrain Grand Prix in April. Revising the floor body, fences and edge, Ferrari also introduced a redesigned diffuser.

F1 2025: The season’s winners and losers

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But while it was a notable improvement as the team emerged as the second fastest on the grid, Leclerc concedes it needs a few races before it can accurately judge the update.

“The upgrade we brought definitely played a role,” he told DAZN. “How big is the step? We’ll have to wait two or three races to judge it properly.

“But I’m happy because the team is pushing flat out and hopefully we’ll bring more parts soon to make another step forward.

“What we need now is pure pace because McLaren is too strong, but we can be proud of our weekend because there was nothing more. We knew our car is a bit better in race trim than in qualifying and it’s been like that again.

“McLaren is on another level. We still need more upgrades to close that gap. The team is working very hard and I know they’ll come, but I don’t know when or how much – and I hope it helps us reduce the gap.”

Going into a more detail in the post-race press conference, Leclerc revealed where Ferrari’s deficit is compared to the McLaren MCL39.

“I think we are losing mostly on the high speed this weekend, which was expected. We expected to lose a little bit compared to McLaren in the high speed, but probably we expected to lose even more in the low speed, which was a little bit less the case. So, we’ll analyse that,” he said.

Although Ferrari won’t bring more upgrades to the next race, this weekend’s British Grand Prix, Leclerc says there are new parts in the pipeline that will still be introduced this year.

“There’s nothing been confirmed yet for Silverstone, so I won’t comment on that,” he told the media, including PlanetF1.com. “Of course, there are upgrades in the waiting, but I don’t exactly know when they will be ready.

“The team has done an incredible job at pushing to try and get them as early as possible. I know that they are still pushing extremely hard to have other upgrades as soon as possible, which I hope will make another difference and will help us to be a bit closer to McLaren, to Red Bull in their good days, or to Mercedes even in their good days.

“So, yeah, we are pushing hard, and I hope that we see the result as soon as possible.”

Following his fourth podium of the season, Leclerc sits fifth in the Drivers’ standings on 119 points, 27 behind Russell and 36 down on Max Verstappen for a spot on the F1 2025 season’s podium.

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