Charles Leclerc admits copying Pierre Gasly brought him the time gain which saw him to take fourth on the grid for the Sakhir Grand Prix.
Ferrari has been struggling on the high-speed Outer Circuit in Bahrain with the car also proving very nervous on the bumpy new section of track in Sector 2.
But despite all that, Leclerc even shocked himself by finishing just a quarter of a second off pole with his first run in Q3, admitting afterwards it was pretty close to perfect.
“Yes, I was [surprised],” he said. “I don’t know, I don’t like to say it’s a perfect lap. You can always do something better but honestly, everything I wanted to do, I did it.
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“I was scared because I broke very, very late into the first corner but managed to make the corner anyway, and had a good exit too.
“I think I also got a snap in Turn 4 and then I thought ‘oh my God, I don’t know if the tyres will last to the end of the lap’ and here I was very quick.
“I did such a huge step from FP3 to quali there by using a lot more the track on the entry kerb [into the Turn 7/8 chicane] looking at Pierre Gasly’s onboard actually after FP3 so thanks, Pierre.
“The last corner, which I have been struggling in the whole quali, I finally managed to do it well also in my last lap.”
While Mercedes did three runs in Q3, only one new set of softs limited Leclerc to that single flying lap in the top-10 shootout.
And he admits it was a gamble to go early when most would wait for potentially better track conditions in the final moments.
“I’m so happy because it was kind of a bet to go out at the beginning of the session and not go out again,” he said.
LEC: “It was really good. It was really good!”
Leclerc posts a mega lap to momentarily go P2 – he’s now watching from the pit wall! ?#BahrainGP ?? #F1 pic.twitter.com/qBAl9uzt8h
— Formula 1 (@F1) December 5, 2020
Though Leclerc has now qualified ‘best of the rest’ behind Mercedes and Max Verstappen on four occasions this season, he does fear his joy might be short-lived looking ahead to Sunday
“I think a few times this year we’ve been qualifying ahead than what we probably should have and this brings us to a lot of hope for Sunday and then get frustrated in the car on Sunday but let’s be realistic,” he said.
“We need to learn from it. Tomorrow is going to be a difficult day. I don’t think we will be as competitive as we are today. I don’t think we are the fourth fastest car on track so let’s wait and see but I will try and maximise what I have.”