‘My mistake’ says Leclerc as he shoulders the blame for dramatic FP2 crash in Budapest

Second practice in Hungary was brought to a dramatic halt when Charles Leclerc suffered a hefty crash into the barriers, with the Monegasque fortunately emerging unharmed.

Around 15 minutes into the session, Leclerc took a little too much kerb coming out of Turn 4 at the Hungaroring before losing the rear of his Ferrari and spinning into the wall before Turn 5.

LIVE COVERAGE: Follow all the action from second practice for the Hungarian Grand Prix

The yellow flags were initially waved before this became red flags as the marshals set to removing the stricken SF-24 from the circuit. Leclerc, meanwhile, returned to the pits in the medical car, with his session seemingly over.

It was an undesirable moment for Ferrari, who are looking to understand their upgraded floor this weekend in Hungary as they seek to pull themselves back into the fight with Red Bull, Mercedes and McLaren.

Speaking after his early exit from the session, Leclerc took the blame for the error as he explained how it had happened.

“When I lost it, I thought the damage would be much bigger,” the 26-year-old said. “The damage is not that big, but it’s enough for us to not continue the session and that’s never what you want.

FP2: Norris sets the pace while Leclerc brings out red flags during second practice in Hungary

“What happened is that I ran a bit wide on the kerb, I got a snap in the middle of Turn 4, got a bit wide on the kerb and then lost the car on the kerb. So it was my mistake, but now it’s all about bouncing back tomorrow.

“Until now the car was pretty good, the feeling is getting a little bit better – we had more of a consistent day compared to the last three or four weekends, so that’s positive. Unfortunately, with the mistake the mileage was cut short, but hopefully we’ll recover that in FP3.”

The day looked to have started well for Ferrari, with Carlos Sainz topping the timesheets in FP1 ahead of Max Verstappen and Leclerc.

Asked if the stronger level of performance seen prior to his crash was a sign that the updates being run on the car this weekend are working, Leclerc played down expectations yet sounded a note of optimism.

“I wouldn’t get carried away too quickly, but the feeling is good,” he conceded. “I think we are still quite a bit behind McLaren – McLaren seem to be super strong this weekend. However, as I said, the feeling is good and that’s always a good sign. Now we’ve got to put everything together tomorrow, and I hope we’ll do that.”

HIGHLIGHTS: Enjoy the Hungaroring FP2 action as Norris goes quickest for McLaren while Leclerc crashes out

While Leclerc was forced to watch much of FP2 from the sidelines, Sainz ended the session in third place. Following a difficult spell for the Scuderia of late, the Spaniard was pleased with their Friday in Hungary.

“We had a better day for sure than what we’ve had [during] the last three weekends,” he commented after the session. “We’re still yet to understand whether it’s the upgrades delivering a bit better, like we were trying to do, or also maybe a bit of track characteristics involved, which could maybe [be] suiting our car a bit better.

“But, yeah, we seemed to be a bit more competitive. When you look a bit more in detail in the long runs, you can see we’re still not exactly the fastest out there, and there’s still Red Bull and McLaren a clear step ahead, but at least over one lap we seem to be a bit more [in] the ballpark.”

While this could prove useful come qualifying – given that the Hungaroring can sometimes be a challenging venue to overtake on – Sainz added: “At the same time we seem to always see everyone turning it up in Q3 a bit more than us, so I prefer to remain a bit on the cautious side and not to take too many conclusions from today.

“It was a tough day for everyone with the heat and the car handling so, yeah, I think everyone’s going to change quite a bit the car set-up going into tomorrow, and [everyone is] going to take steps forward.”

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Quizzed on how difficult it was to find grip amid the warm conditions, Sainz admitted that it had been “very tricky”.

“Even FP2, the cloud coverage came and it seemed to be the track temperature dropping, but it wasn’t really any cooler, at least on the car, and the tyres still seemed to be degrading quite a lot,” the 29-year-old said.

“So I’m quite interested to see what’s going to happen in the race, because it’s really warm and the tyres are degrading, and I think it’s going to be tough for everyone.”