Charles Leclerc was putting up a fine battle against title rival Max Verstappen in the French Grand Prix when he lost the back end of his Ferrari and crashed.
As Alex Kalinauckas shows in our race analysis, Ferrari and Leclerc had performed brilliantly to offset Red Bull’s straightline speed advantage at Paul Ricard. The race was finely poised – with both teams reckoning they could win it – before the moment that took the sting out of the race and made the championship ‘battle’ look more mathematical than realistic, with Verstappen now 63 points clear.
