Interview
León has full ‘trust’ in Campos after climbing up to third in Standings
Noel León is full of confidence going into the Barcelona Feature Race despite a difficult Sprint that saw him finish P4.
The Campos Racing driver started from pole on Saturday but dropped to P2 on the run to Turn 1, before also losing out to teammate Nikola Tsolov, Gabriele Minì and Colton Herta.
But the race started to come to León late on, as he found himself embroiled in a battle for the final spot on the podium with Tsolov, Herta and Rafael Câmara on the last lap.
However, the Mexican rookie settled for fourth, and speaking afterwards, he says that was the maximum he and Campos could achieve.
“I mean, it’s not what we wanted,” he said. “Today we maximised what we could achieve. We just didn't have the pace to be up there.
“I'm happy with the things that I did, because I managed the tyres very well, and at the end I was able to fight a bit for the podium.
“Unfortunately, I had an issue, so I couldn't overtake. It’s a shame because I think the podium today was possible.
“But we're still not very happy. Tomorrow, we need to make some adjustments to go faster and to be a bit more competitive.”
When asked what those changes might be León would not say but did reveal that he and Campos know exactly where they were strong and where they were weak.
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“I mean, we know where we can be stronger,” he explained. “The good thing is that in some areas we were quite strong. So I think if we fix this, we'll be very competitive.
“I'm confident with the team that for tomorrow they will make a good set of changes and we'll be competitive.”
Talking more about his battle in the end with his teammate Tsolov, León says the respect both drivers have for each other showed on track, and that they both achieved the best result possible for the team.
“It's always difficult to race against your teammates, especially as we are battling in the championship,” he said. “So it's always difficult, as you don't want to make contact.
“I want to be honest, we raced pretty clean, when I defended, when he defended. So at the end of the day, we didn't have more, and at some point, we need to also be competitive. So with P3 and P4 today, it was the best we could do.”
“The car was not able to go any quicker, and these things are very important. So tomorrow we'll try to go further.”
While this was not the day León would have wanted, he did climb up to third in the Drivers' Championship – 21 points behind leader Minì.
This as well as the performance of the team give him a lot of confidence going into Sunday’s Feature Race.
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“I feel very confident, to be honest,” he continued. “I trust a lot in the team, in my engineers, and in my mechanics. I know there will be a massive step for tomorrow in terms of pace, and we'll be able to do some good stuff.
“Obviously, we want to close the gap. But it's still a long way to go. We just need to focus race by race, and it will come naturally. We'll see what happens.”