Exclusive: Arthur Leclerc on his Le Mans Hypercar dream, winning for Ferrari and more!
- Owen Bradley
- 6 minutes ago
- 10 min read
Arthur Leclerc currently drives for Ferrari AF Corse in the GT World Challenge Europe (GTWC EU), and is also a development driver for Ferrari's Formula One team. In this exclusive interview, DIVEBOMB's Owen Bradley speaks with Leclerc on a variety of topics, such as the Monegasque's victory at Brands Hatch in the GT World Challenge Europe, his Ferrari Hypercar dream and his desire to race at Le Mans with his brother, Charles Leclerc.
Leclerc is in just his second season racing in the GTWC with Ferrari AF Corse, and took victory at the very first Sprint Cup race of the season in Brands Hatch. The 25-year old currently sits 14th in the overall standings of the GTWC, after just three events.
Speaking about his start to the 2026 season, Leclerc stated: "I think it's been quite an okay start, the result in Paul Ricard I'm not so proud of, I think we could've done a better job, we were struggling. Then, in Brands Hatch, I was really happy with qualifying P2, plus the win in the first race, was really a boost and good, so I'm quite happy about my performance and I still feel that there is some room to improve."
He continued: "I can clearly see a difference between last year and this year with the GT World Challenge. The GTWC is a really special championship, how to take the traffic, how to manage the traffic, so there is still room for a lot of improvement, but quite happy with my performance at the start of the season."
Leclerc became a winner in the GTWC for the first time with Ferrari AF Corse at Brands Hatch after a tough fight at the front. Chris Lulham and Dani Juncadella came across the line to take the chequered flag, but were eventually given a five-second penalty after a pit stop infringement.
Speaking about winning with Ferrari on an international level, Leclerc said: "It was great, it was a really intense race. I really love Brands Hatch, especially for qualifying, it's a really challenging track where taking risk is giving you big rewards in terms of lap times, and everything can go wrong so quickly because there is grass and then the wall. That is quite a fun track, especially in qualifying. We managed to do a really good qualifying, and the win, especially when you win for Ferrari, it's something even more special. It was great."
Having inherited the victory with teammate Thomas Neubauer, Leclerc and Ferrari AF Corse celebrated, with the No.50 squad sitting in second place in the Sprint Cup standings.
When asked about his goal for the GTWC season, Leclerc revealed: "The goal for me is always to win the championship. I really do think that this car is capable of winning the championship, and our team is doing a really good job as well. So, for me, the target will be to win the championship, not just one race."
He added: "For this, we need to put everything together good, so the team, myself, teammates. Endurance is really difficult because it depends on so many different factors, so many factors we need to get right to win this kind of championship. It's a big challenge, but I like big challenges."
Despite a strong start in the Sprint Cup, the No.50 AF Corse Ferrari squad have not yet scored points in the Endurance Cup, finishing 19th at the opening race of the season in Paul Ricard, and on the cusp of points at Monza, with an 11th place finish.
Sometimes in the GTWC, there can be a different champion in both the Endurance and Sprint Cups, with there also being an ultimate champion across both cups combined. Endurance is typically a much more difficult cup to win, due to longer races breeding more accidents and subsequently circumstances and opportunities for every team and driver to capitalise on.
The Sprint Cup, on the other hand, lends itself to a slightly more familiar style of racing, with two, one hour races featuring just a single pitstop each. Given Leclerc's background in single seater racing, the Sprint Cup is arguably more similar to the shorter races in open-wheel racing categories.
When asked if just winning one of the cups would be enough to satisfy him, Leclerc stated: "We need to see everything in its entire picture. I would be happy if I won both championships, not just one championship in particular. Every race weekend I will give my best to come home with a win."
He added: "Then, we need to see the overall picture once again. Endurance depends on so many factors, that you need to get right every aspect of. I'm working as hard as I can to get all of those aspects in my control and try to bring us further, I will be fully satisfied if I win both championships, we need to see how big the challenge is."
The Monegasque has gone from light, single seater, open wheel, open cockpit racing to now driving in GT3 Sportscar machinery. This transition has proven challenging for other drivers in the past, and with Leclerc also a development driver for Ferrari's F1 team, it means that he is constantly having to adapt between two different machines and driving styles.
When asked how he has successfully navigated the transition between single seaters and sportscars, Leclerc said: "To drive the GT3 car, you need to have quite a lot of adaptation, because the car is a bit more heavy and has less aerodynamics. If you look at the overall GT3, we have the best car in terms of driving, the one that is the closest to a single seater car, so that's helping a lot and Ferrari is helping a lot to drive this GT3."
He continued: "In this championship, the most tricky thing is understanding the rules and the setup of the car, what the team is asking and working with your teammate as well. It's really a lot more teamwork rather than just working by yourself, and this is the biggest thing I'm improving, especially this year as I was maybe not the best in previous years! To really try to work for everyone, to move the team forward, that I think is the biggest challenge of GT World."
With Leclerc only a few seasons into his Sportscar and Endurance racing journey, the 25-year old has already achieved great success, and is on track to have a strong and competitive 2026 season.
When asked if he has a particular race he would like to win in Sportscars, Leclerc said: "The 24 Hours of Le Mans is the first race that comes to my mind, because it's one of the biggest races in the world, with the Monaco Grand Prix. My dream, one day, is that it doesn't clash with Formula One - and that I will be able to do Le Mans with my brother. I need to work on my path to get there, and hopefully if all the stars align, we will be able to do that."
Many of the flagship races in Sportscar racing occur in the Intercontinental GT Challenge, WEC and IMSA. Leclerc will be participating in the GTWC EU's flagship race later this month, the 24 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps.
Speaking about whether he will race in the IGTC or WEC in his career, Leclerc revealed: "Yeah, of course! I'm doing a lot for Formula One as well, which is taking me a lot of time, but the target for me is to be more and more involved in Endurance, because I just love that racing. I also love the environment, with AF Corse. The team is in such a good mood, of course, it's an Italian team so you have fun and I love the environment I'm working in, working every day to improve all aspects of myself, to try and one day reach Hypercar because that's my dream."
Leclerc left Formula 2 following the 2023 season, and has since re-focused and re-centred his career on Sportscar racing, alongside being a development driver for Ferrari in F1. Leaving single seater racing has often been quite risky for young drivers, as those are the cars they have been with throughout their career, with a goal of reaching Formula One.
Speaking about the most difficult period of his career, Leclerc revealed: "The last three years have been really tricky, especially mentally. It's a big change, to go into endurance. Mentally, you need to re-adapt to something completely different, you need to also forget the dream to go into the Formula One car, or be an F1 driver, even though the door is never closed."
Leclerc added: "I have a really specific career and now, I'm so grateful to be where I am because I started at 17 years old in motorsport, whereas 90% of the grid started at seven, and have been racing for most of their life. For three years, let's say I was seeing only the negative, which was not the best. Now, I'm aware of how lucky I am to do what I love, to be a professional racing driver, also for Ferrari, which is the one of the biggest brands in the world. There is so many positives now, but it's true that the last three years has been a bit tricky."
Leclerc has been able to drive in official Formula One practice sessions in Abu Dhabi, alongside his brother in the other car. However, Arthur Leclerc has had to pause his dream of racing in F1, with his goal now being to race in the Hypercar class of the WEC.
When asked about the difficulty to restructure and pause his F1 dream, Leclerc expanded on what he said earlier, adding: "I think the most difficult thing is, when I was in that state let's say, for three years, you aren't really looking at the reality. It was a hard time, when I was younger, because I always was dreaming so big, I maybe sometimes did not enjoy it in the moment."
He continued: "I think since I started at 17 years old, I was never really happy or satisfied with my performance, I always wanted better and better, more and more. That translated on the track, with over-pushing and putting a lot of pressure on myself, which helped me in a way to get better and I think was very useful for now, but not working at that time, because I was putting too much pressure on myself, doing small mistakes. It was more about just facing reality, really. I'm so lucky, so happy and so proud of who I am now and so grateful to be with Ferrari and AF Corse which is so competitive, fighting for wins."
Sportscar racing has recently attracted some huge names such as: Max Verstappen, Valentino Rossi, Lance Stroll and Arthur Leclerc, with both him and his brother Charles Leclerc, mentioning individually that they would like to race at Le Mans. Other drivers such as George Russell, Kimi Antonelli, Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris, have also stated that they are interested in racing at Le Mans, among other Sportscar races like the Nurburgring 24 Hours.
When asked why drivers such as himself, and other huge names, are interested by endurance racing, Leclerc stated: "It's pure racing. Formula One, it's incredible, it's amazing, I love F1 and I am really passionate about it, but endurance is really pure racing. There's over 250 drivers in Spa, which is like the highest level in the world, with drivers that have been in Formula One, that are doing Formula E or Hypercar, racing all together."
Leclerc continued: "The challenge is so big when you go for 24 Hours, anything can happen. Winning the 24 hours with your teammates, with the team, that is a feeling that you cannot really get anywhere else. There's something really special about endurance where, as a driver, as a team, there is nothing like a win in this category because after 24 hours of work, with no sleep, the engineers with zero sleep, still thinking about the strategy, the setup, everything during a 24 hour race, the challenge is so huge that when you arrive to the finish line, if you win, you are the most happy man in the world."
When in single seater racing, the driver is completely alone with the car, and doesn't have to share it with anybody else. This allows them to finely tune the car to every inch of how they like it to be. In Sportscar racing, this is not quite possible, with a team of drivers behind every car.
When asked about the mentality switch from driving alone to racing with a team of drivers, Leclerc said: "That's the thing that I think I've learned the most, to work with your teammates and to work with the team. Everyone has different thinking, everyone has different opinions sometimes, but you need to make it work and you need to stay with the group, so that everyone is happy.
"It could be the engineer testing something completely different, not how you want it, or another driver testing something, and that's the big thing of Endurance - you need to make everyone happy. We need to push altogether in the same direction, and that's big work to do, because it's not easy to work with so many drivers and so many engineers, it's a challenge."
Leclerc has successfully adapted to various styles of car in his career, and has taken victories in all types of machinery. However, when asked to pick out one specific career highlight, one specific motorsport memory of his career so far, Leclerc said: "I think it was Mugello, in Formula Regional Europe."
He added: "There was three races, and I won all three races out of the three, and it was the perfect weekend for me, I think I got pole position, race one, P1, race two it was raining, we did a mistake with the strategy and did one pitstop more than everyone under the safety car, came back through the field and won.
It was really one of my best memories because that's where I was the most proud of myself, in such tricky conditions, we had all conditions, dry and wet, pitstops and everything, it was the most difficult weekend but my most successful weekend. That's the most happy weekend I've had."
Arthur Leclerc will race at the 24 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps with Ferrari AF Corse at the end of this month in what is set to be an extraordinary endurance race with a star-studded grid.
A huge thanks to Arthur Leclerc and to the entire AF Corse team who made this interview possible.
