SILVERSTONE, England -- A despondent Charles Leclerc blamed himself for qualifying sixth at the British Grand Prix, saying: "I need to be better."
Ferrari had looked like strong contenders for pole position coming into qualifying but faded in Q3, as Max Verstappen took pole position ahead of the McLaren drivers.
Leclerc will start on the third row, with teammate Lewis Hamilton directly ahead of him on the grid in fourth position.
After his final qualifying effort, Leclerc made his feelings clear over the radio.
"F---, f---, f---, f---, f--- that," he shouted. "So f---ing shit I am. I am so f---ing shit. That's all I am."
Leclerc continued to be self-critical as he spoke to the media after getting out of the car.
When asked where the session got away from him, he replied: "More than getting away from me, I'm not doing the job.
"And I think since the beginning of the season, I've been performing very well in the races. And looking back at races, there are actually not many races where I would go back to change something that I've done inside the car.
"Unfortunately, when I look back at qualifying, which used to be my strength, there are many qualifying where I would like to go back and to change something, because every time I get to Q3, for some reason, it's not clicking.
"At the moment, we've had good qualifying, but we didn't have great qualifying. And again, this used to be my strength, so I'm not happy with the level that I'm showing in qualifying.
"We've got issues, for sure, particularly today, from Q2 onwards, we been fighting with something inside the car. But it's not an excuse. I need to be better."
When asked if he could turn it around in the race, he said: "I hope. But starting P6 again, it makes it so difficult, because every time we are starting the race by fighting to come back, and then once we are back at the front, people that have had a clean race just have an advantage on us, so we need to be better in qualifying."
Although largely pointing the finger of blame at himself, Leclerc did give a cryptic answer about the handling of the car.
"The issues are very specific with the ones we have. It's not a balance issue, it's not a grip issue. I don't want to go into the detail, but it's just something very weird that we've got to fight with the car, and especially when they are high speed corners, it makes it even more difficult. But I hope we can resolve it. The good thing, if we can say it's a good thing, is that tomorrow, we won't have any of this, for sure we won't have any of problems of that sort.
Asked if the problems have been apparent all year or have emerged recently, Leclerc simply said: "I was expecting too much. I cannot go into it."
The Monaco native then walked away, ending his press session there.