Charles Marc Herve Perceval Leclerc, born October 16th 1997, hails from the principality of Monaco and currently drives for the famed Scuderia Ferrari. He started karting at the age of five and went on to win the GP3 Championship in 2016 followed by the Formula 2 Championship in 2017. In 2016 Charles was already part of the Ferrari Driver Academy and was working as a development driver for Haas F1 and Scuderia Ferrari. When he won the Formula 2 series in 2017 he became the youngest ever champion at the age of 19 years and 356 days old. At the time, he was also one of only four drivers to win the Formula 2 Championship in their rookie year. The others were Nico Rosberg, Lewis Hamilton and Nico Hulkenberg. In 2018 Leclerc signed with the Sauber F1 Team and was later named F1 Rookie of The Year. For the 2019 season, Charles signed with Scuderia Ferrari, replacing 2007 World Champion Kimi Raikkonen.
Charles Leclerc was born to Herve and Pascale Leclerc. His father, Herve, raced GP3 cars in the 1980s and 90s but sadly passed away in 2017 at the age of 54 after a long battle with cancer. Charles also has an older brother, Lorenzo, and a younger brother, Arthur, who signed with the Ferrari Driver Academy in 2020 and competes in Formula 3. As a boy, Charles raced karts at a track in Nice owned by Jules Bianchi’s father, Philippe, who was a childhood friend of Herve’s. It was there that Jules and Charles formed a special bond resulting in Jules, eight years his senior, becoming a mentor to Charles as well as his godfather. Unfortunately, in 2015, having made it to Formula One, Jules succumbed to injuries he suffered at the previous year’s Japanese Grand Prix, and neither Jules nor Charles Leclerc’s father got to see him compete in Formula One. At the Monaco Grand Prix in 2019, Charles paid tribute to his two greatest idols by wearing a specially designed helmet that resembled Bianchi’s on one half and his father’s on the other.
Charles Leclerc is on the right trajectory in Formula One but his speed hasn’t always translated into wins, racking up only five while he has recorded twenty-three pole positions. He’s proven that he can be incredibly quick but has suffered at times from bad luck and poor strategy decisions by Ferrari. During the wet, rain soaked 2022 Monaco Grand Prix, Leclerc had taken pole and led the race into lap nineteen when he pitted to swap his full wet tires for intermediates after Perez and Verstappen attempted the undercut. Leclerc’s teammate, Carlos Sainz, had elected to stay out and was called into the pits on lap twenty-one, but Ferrari accidentally called Leclerc in as well, presumably to put on dry tires after only 2 laps on the intermediates. Consequently, Leclerc was held up in the pit box behind Sainz and was only able to get back to 4th position by the final lap. Without that error, Ferrari could have easily scored a 1-2 finish, but at least Leclerc finished the race. In 6 attempts, going all the way back to his Formula 2 career in 2017, Charles has only been able to finish the race once. Is it just bad luck or the Curse of Monaco? There’s no doubt that once Ferrari can deliver the right car and the right strategy, Charles Leclerc has the talent to win championships.