Charles Leclerc says he’s not interested in assuming the No.1 driver role at Ferrari next season.
The Monegasque has been steadily increasing his influence at the Italian team and currently sits ahead of Sebastian Vettel in the championship, having achieved two wins and six poles.
However, despite being seen as the medium-to-long-term future of Ferrari as well as also trying to establish some authority, he insists his teammate is still better placed than him to hold that lead driver role.
“I’ve got no idea, but Sebastian has won four world championships, I haven’t won any,” he told Channel 4 on whether he expected No.1 status.
“I believe he has a lot of experience. He’s very quick, very strong, I’m learning a lot from him and then at the end [of the season] we will see, it’s not me making the decision who is No.1 or No.2.
“At the moment I am happy like this and very lucky to have Seb next to me.”
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Expanding on the experience element, Leclerc noted how it would be impossible for him to guide Ferrari on key issues going into 2020.
“It’s a bit new to me to look at next year’s car because until now I have been changing teams every year,” he said.
“But at the moment I’m learning from that and I think it really helps to have Seb next to me who is used to these type of things, to see how he works on the development of the car, what is the key things to say to the engineer.
“There are so many things that you can say to an engineer, but if you say all of those things, you can confuse them a little bit, so you need to choose what you want to say, and at this Seb is helping quite a lot.”
His impact on F1 this season can’t be understated, however, and has often seen Leclerc receive high praise from Lewis Hamilton.
“Lewis has always been really nice to me and every time he came to see me, it was to say nice things, so to hear these type of things from such champions is always an honour,” he said.
“I used to watch Formula 1 and there was always Lewis there, and you are dreaming of one day joining, so to now finally fight with him on-track, and him telling nice things about me, it’s always nice.”