Leclerc will “think twice” about driving historic F1 cars after Monaco crash

Leclerc was taking part in a demonstration run at the 2022 Monaco Historic event last Sunday when the 1974 Ferrari 312B3 suffered a brake issue.

The 2022 Bahrain and Australian GP winner was on his third lap when he lost the rear of the car into the famous Rascasse right-hander, ending up in the barriers.

His teammate Carlos Sainz said on Thursday that he wouldn’t want to take the risk of driving a historic car while Ferrari were in the title fight.

Despite his crash, Leclerc said it was “always an honour” for him to drive historic cars and that “it’s also part of our job and sometimes we need to go into those cars.”

He said: “To be honest, before that I think all the checks that had to be done was done.

“Obviously there was a shakedown of this car the Thursday before and yeah, the failure that happened was on a screw of the brake pads and it’s impossible to know.

“So fighting for a championship like this, I will think twice about doing it again in the future, but yeah, it’s also part of our job and sometimes we need to go into those cars.

“It’s always also an honour for me and I’m always very happy and very glad to be driving those cars and always a pleasure too.

“But yeah, it’s always a balance you need to find and of course when you are fighting for the championship, or just overall, because it’s for safety in general.

“I had a lot of fun and this was unfortunate but again, it was just unlucky.”

Leclerc also recently tested Gilles Villeneuve’s revered 312T4 from 1979 around Fiorano to mark the 40th anniversary of the Canadian grand prix winner’s death.

But he said he had more fun in Lauda’s car due to the 312T4 running on museum tyres.

Leclerc said: “Niki’s one was amazing until the failure, it was a bit less amazing there, but to be honest the one of Gilles that I drove had the museum tyres, so I couldn’t push at all, they were very very old tyres and it was difficult to go over 100km/h.

“I…