Formula 1: Will Charles Leclerc prove Jacques Villeneuve wrong in 2019?

Jacques Villeneuve stated that Sebastian Vettel would “eat Charles Leclerc alive” if the two became teammates at Ferrari in the 2019 Formula 1 season. Will Leclerc make Villeneuve eat his words?

In August of 2018, Scuderia Ferrari had not yet confirmed their driver lineup for the 2019 Formula 1 season. Rumors went back and forth regarding who the teammate to four-time champion Sebastian Vettel would be, as the decision was down to 2007 champion Kimi Raikkonen or Alfa Romeo Sauber rookie Charles Leclerc.

The Italian team ended up selecting Leclerc to replace Raikkonen for the 2019 season, as he reportedly signed a deal that will keep him with Ferrari through at least the 2022 season.

Raikkonen, meanwhile, is set to drive for Sauber (now Alfa Romeo Racing), although he is technically set to do so as the replacement for the IndyCar-bound Marcus Ericsson since the team’s title sponsorship agreement with Alfa Romeo allows Ferrari to select one of their drivers and Leclerc was Ferrari’s choice for the 2018 season while Antonio Giovinazzi is their choice for the 2019 season.

But back in August of 2018 when the only confirmed Ferrari driver for the 2019 season was Vettel, who signed a three-year contract extension in August of 2017 to remain with the team through the 2020 season, 1997 Formula 1 champion Jacques Villeneuve made a bold claim about Vettel and Leclerc assuming the two drivers ended up as teammates for the 2019 season.

Here is what Villeneuve had to say about the matter, according to Formula 1.

"“Look at the work [Kimi’s] been doing. He’s third in the championship, he’s often quicker than Vettel and when he’s not he’s just a tenth behind. He’s paramount in the development of the car. The whole team works fantastically well now.“Put a young ‘cub’ next to Vettel and what will Vettel do? He’ll try to eat him alive. Either he will destroy the young cub or it will end in tears and the whole team will end up going slower within two years. That’s not constructive.“Charles is still making a few mistakes. It would be amazing for him [to go to Ferrari], but it would be two years of Ferrari preparing him. Ferrari, like Mercedes, is not a team to prepare drivers. It’s a top team. Top teams they pay for the drivers when they are at their best and when they want them. That’s why you have junior teams, to prepare them.”"

Now that Leclerc has been confirmed as Vettel’s teammate for the upcoming season, will he make Villeneuve eat his words?

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Leclerc is a driver who many people believe has the potential not only to beat Vettel in his first season driving for Ferrari but to win the championship in it. As a result, when he made clear that his goal was to win two races in his first season driving for the team, that goal was seen as somewhat modest by many fans.

However, all Leclerc really did was state that he would like to win the Monaco Grand Prix, his home race, and the Italian Grand Prix, Ferrari’s home race. In other words, his goal is to win at least those two races in his first season driving for Ferrari.

But even if Leclerc’s goal was simply to earn the first two victories of his Formula 1 career this year, him accomplishing that goal would prove Villeneuve wrong — and by far.

After returning to Ferrari ahead of the 2014 season, Raikkonen drove in 99 races for the team before the 2018 season ended. He won just one of those 99 races and took the pole positions for two of them.

Yet according to Villeneuve, Raikkonen was doing a fantastic job and was “often quicker” than Vettel, who has earned 13 victories and nine pole positions since arriving at Ferrari ahead of the 2015 season.

Two victories for Leclerc in the 2019 season would double Raikkonen’s win total from the 2014 season through the 2018 in roughly one-fifth of the number of races.

Despite the fact that he has outperformed Raikkonen by far over the last four seasons, Vettel, meanwhile, is a mistake-prone driver who has thrown away chances to win both of the last two championships via unforced errors.

Villeneuve was not completely inaccurate by stating that “Charles is still making a few mistakes”. After all, rookies are supposed to make mistakes, and Leclerc was barely halfway through his rookie season when Villeneuve made this claim.

But for some reason, the 47-year-old Canadian ignored the fact that Vettel has thrown away a boatload of points, of which many he had already thrown away back when Villeneuve made these comments, relative to Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport’s Lewis Hamilton as a result of his own mistakes over the last two seasons as well as the fact that these mistakes cost him the opportunity to potentially be a five-time champion or even a six-time champion.

Instead, Hamilton won the 2017 and 2018 championships and became just the third driver in Formula 1 history to win at least five championships.

Will Villeneuve eat his words by the time the 2019 Formula 1 season wraps up? With all things considered, he probably won’t even need to wait nearly that long to do so.

Will Charles Leclerc perform well enough in the 2019 Formula 1 season, especially when compared to teammate Sebastian Vettel, in what is set to be his first season driving for Ferrari to make Jacques Villeneuve eat his words?

Melbourne Grand Prix Circuit in Melbourne, Australia is set to play host to the first of 21 races on this year’s schedule. The season opener, the Australian Grand Prix, is scheduled to take place at 1:10 a.m. ET on Sunday, March 17, and it is scheduled to be broadcast live on ESPN.