Liam Lawson Questions Legality of Charles Leclerc's Late Move at Interlagos
Liam Lawson left Interlagos with points on the board and a question on his lips: was Charles Leclerc’s late lunge for seventh actually legal?
In the drizzle and chaos of the closing laps of the São Paulo Grand Prix, the Ferrari and the rookie went to war. Lap 69 of 71, Turn 12, the track slick and unforgiving. Leclerc dived in, his right-front clipping Lawson’s left-rear as they powered up the hill. The contact shoved the New Zealander wide and handed Leclerc the momentum he needed.
Lawson clung on into Turn 1, refusing to yield. The two then went wheel-to-wheel in a fierce scrap that ran into the next lap, but Leclerc finally forced his way through into Turn 4 to claim seventh on the road.
Lawson crossed the line eighth, 1.816s back, but his result is not set in stone. Leclerc has been summoned to the stewards for allegedly causing a collision, leaving the door open for a post-race reshuffle if the Ferrari driver is penalised.
What stung Lawson wasn’t just the move itself, but how familiar it felt.
He immediately drew a line back to 2017, to Leclerc’s notorious GP2 ‘bump and run’ on Alex Albon in Abu Dhabi, when the Monegasque used a nudge into the hairpin to slingshot past and steal victory down the long back straight. The echo was impossible for Lawson to ignore.
Reflecting on the clash, Lawson labelled it a Leclerc “specialty,” pointing out that this time it was the Ferrari’s front wing tagging his tyre.
“I think we got really lucky,” he admitted, noting the contact and hinting at how easily it could have ended with a puncture or worse. Whether the stewards see it as hard racing or a step over the line will now decide how the record books remember it.
Lawson himself is not sure where that line sits. He made it clear the move would be reviewed, but he also acknowledged the ferocity of the fight, describing the duel as a good battle overall, even with the bitter aftertaste.
From launch attack to tyre trouble
The controversy arrived at the end of what had already been a wild afternoon for Lawson.
From third on the grid, he rocketed off the line, immediately sensing a chance to do something special. Grip into Turn 1 was strong, and as he picked off a place, his thoughts flicked briefly to Kimi Antonelli up the road and the tantalising prospect of attacking for the lead of a grand prix for the first time.
For a few corners, it felt possible.
Once the field settled, reality bit. Antonelli’s pace – and that of the cars around Lawson – began to tell. Lawson’s car started leaning harder on its tyres than the frontrunners, the degradation building as the laps ticked by. On a drying track, his speed stabilised at “okay,” but not enough to keep him in the fight with the very front.
That left him defending into the closing stages, trying to keep Leclerc at bay as the Ferrari loomed larger in his mirrors. He held him as long as he could. Then came Turn 12, the contact, and the place lost.
Lawson still walks away with a strong eighth on paper and the satisfaction of having gone toe-to-toe with a Ferrari in the wet at Interlagos. Whether that becomes seventh depends on a roomful of stewards and their view on where hard racing ends and a “specialty” move begins.
