What happened to Leclerc's Ferrari during Hungarian Grand Prix?

As if it wasn't enough for Leclerc to lose out to both McLaren drivers, Lando Norris—the eventual race winner—and Oscar Piastri, he was also passed by Mercedes' George Russell for third.

The Monegasque was also slapped with a five-second time penalty for banging wheels with Russell but kept fourth, as Fernando Alonso was over a minute down the road in fifth.

Just before he was overtaken by Russell, Leclerc delivered an angry message to his engineer over the team radio; he said: "This is so incredibly frustrating.

"We've lost all competitiveness. You just have to listen to me; I would have found a different way of managing those issues.

"Now it's just undriveable. Undrivable! It's a miracle if we finish on the podium," he concluded.

Leclerc's message was not clear and suggested some changes to the car setup that Ferrari applied, which he was not happy about.

And despite Leclerc later revealing it was a chassis issue, former Formula 1 driver turned pundit Martin Brundle tried to shed some light on what those setup changes the Ferrari driver thought were applied to his car would've been.

In his column for Sky Sports F1, Brundle pointed out how unhappy Leclerc was and explained: "He led superbly from pole position and had great pace in the opening stint, even pulling away from Piastri.

"However, his pace increasingly dropped off as the race progressed, and his angsty radio calls were all about him wanting to have handled expected car issues differently.

"Here's what I believe that could be about," Brundle continued. "This Ferrari works much better closer to the ground, especially at the rear, and we often see it heavily bottoming out.

"This can wear the 'plank' underneath and render the car illegal, as happened in China earlier this year," he added, referring to Lewis Hamilton's disqualification from the Chinese Grand Prix for excess plank wear.

Brundle then said: "We know they [Ferrari drivers] sometimes lift off the throttle in high-speed corners to protect that wear when the car is heavily aero loaded.

"In Budapest at his pit stops they raised tyre pressures, which raises the car but gives away grip, and the team also reduced front-wing angle.

"This hurt his pace, and Leclerc eventually finished an angry 42 seconds behind the winner, which included a five-second penalty for unreasonably banging into the side of Russell into Turn 1 when he was being passed for the final step on the podium," Brundle concluded.