Charles Leclerc said his late defeat in Bahra༺in was hard to take after be👍ing denied his maiden Formula 1 victory by an issue on his Ferrari power unit.

Leclerc ran eight seconds clear of Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton with 10 laps remaining and was on course to collect the win for Ferrari, only for the hybrid system on ꦬhis power unit to fail.

The issue left Leclerc powerless to stop both Hamilton and Mercedes teammate Valtteri Bottas from passing, although the Ferrari driver avoided losing any more positions after the race finished behind the Safety Car, leaving him third at the chequered💦 flag.

“It happens. It’s part of motorsport,” a dౠo✱wncast Leclerc said after the race.

“Unfortunately today it was not our day, but I’m confident. The teꦦam has done an amazing job to recover the lack of pace in Australia.

✅“Of course I’m extremely disappointed like the whole team, but it happens in the season.”

While Leclerc took some solace out of his maiden F1 podium finishꦍ - without the late Safety Car, he would have lost at least one more place to Red Bull’s Max Verstappen – he admitted it was a hard loss to take.

“We have been luck💛y in a very unlucky situation bec﷽ause we had the Safety Car at the end, otherwise we would have finished even more rearward, and also I don’t think with the fuel we would have been OK,” Leclerc said.

“Very hard one to take, but thanks to the team🌳 for the amaziಞng car all weekend long. I’m pretty sure we’ll come back stronger.

“I’m never really looking at the result 🎉and I’m more looking at the potential there was to do bꦬetter. Today, third was not our place, but very happy anyway.”