Ferrari’s Sao Paulo Grand Prix pit strategy proved costly for Charles Leclerc, taking away a strong opportunity for a podium finish.

On Lap 25, Leclerc became the first driver to switch to a new set of intermediate tyres, hoping to get ahead as the track conditions worsened. However, this early pit stop backfired when, just seven laps later, a crash by Williams driver Franco Colapinto brought out a red flag.

This allowed other drivers, including Max Verstappen and both Alpine drivers, to pit without losing their positions and let the fans at Interlagos enjoy an unexpected podium.

To make matters worse, when Leclerc rejoined the track after his pit stop, he was stuck behind Oliver Bearman and Lewis Hamilton, even though he had specifically asked his team to keep him out of traffic.

This cost the Monegasque valuable time, and despite his best efforts, he ultimately finished fifth, missing out on a potential top-three finish.

After the race, Ferrari admitted it had underestimated the time loss from pitting early. The Scuderia team boss Frederic Vasseur said the decision to pit early was still reasonable given the weather but admitted that it disrupted their race strategy.

“It’s a difficult Sunday, but I think overall it’s not a dramatic weekend,” said Vasseur quoted by Motorsport Week.

“It’s more on some choices that it was quite difficult to anticipate like the pitstop.

“Unfortunately, you can say at the end of the day if you stay on track [and] you are waiting for the red flag it’s the right call, but if you crash you look stupid.

“Honestly, these kinds of weekends are quite difficult to manage from the pit wall and the car.”

He expanded: “We underestimated I think the loss in the pit exit.

“It was very, very slippery and he lost a couple of tenths and it was enough to lose the position.”

Leclerc himself said that the early switch to intermediate tyres and the team’s setup choice hurt his podium chances.

“I wanted free air, so I asked the team to find free air.

“They boxed me that lap, but unfortunately the pitstop- Not the pit stop, but the pit entry and the pit exit time in the wet was a lot longer than what we thought.

“I ended up in the middle of traffic with Ollie and Lewis, and from that moment I knew that we were losing so much. There was a Safety Car we lost like three, four positions.”

He added: “I think I’m partly to blame, because we decided [on] set-ups together with the team and today I wanted to go into that direction.

“However, it was the wrong route for sure. Today, the pace was just not there.”

The Monegasque is now officially ruled out of the championship battle, which remains between Lando Norris and Max Verstappen, however, Ferrari is still in the game for the Constructors' Championship, currently sitting 36 points behind McLaren.