Picture To Burn [Charles Leclerc]

4. Anti-Hero

I'm the problem, it's me...

***

We stayed for two more weeks in the beautiful Maranello before flying to the very first stop of the 2024, Formula 1 racing season: Bahrein.

When we first arrived to one of the hidden jewels of the Persian Gulf, my eyes couldn't believe it.

Bahrein was a symphony of contrasts where the golden hues of the desert danced with the turquoise of the sea. Skyscrapers stood tall as modern sentinels of the ancient souks, where the fragrance of sweet spices blended with the salty air. It was simply amazing.

I didn't see the drivers for three weeks, since they had arrived to the desert much sooner than I for their pre-season tests.

In my remaining time in Maranello, Gina made me take some marketing and social media management courses, so I could know what kind of stuff to post and how to handle any sort of situation in the social media.

But I also took advantage of the free period to try and get to know absolutely everything I could about Charles and Carlos and, Lord was it much...

Carlos basically had a clean slate. He had had some unfounded allegations about being a womanizer a few years ago, but the rumors died quickly. He was basically a sunshine. A spanish treasure.

Charles, on the other hand, was interesting...

He had basically been F1's golden boy for years. He had always been handsome, girls and boys desired him and had a charm like no other.

Until last year.

As soon as I typed his name in the browser, scandal after scandal popped out in my screen.

For what I read online, he had a long term girlfriend and apparently, he cheated on her halfway through last year's season with the girl's best friend. And that had been the beginning of it.

After that, the media almost destroyed him. He started crashing during races, not finishing them, his performance lowered massively. He would be spotted with different girls every week and he also started partying like a maniac.

But deep down, I kind of felt that there was much more to the story. Such a drastic change was odd to happen.

I was intrigued.

The first few days of the season in Bahrein had been good for the team. Both Charles and Carlos did good on the free practices. No incidents and they both achieved good times.

Qualifying had been a bit more challenging, since the Red Bull team had practically built a rocket, but they still handled it pretty well. The Ferrari car was in fact, a good car, just as the engineers had promised weeks ago.

Carlos would be starting the race in P5 and Charles in P2.

I had been taking some pictures of them from afar but before the race of tomorrow, the team needed some individual shots for the socials.

I started with Carlos.

Everything went smoothly with him and I even took the chance to get to know him a little more. He truly was a sweetheart, and ridicously handsome too. Working with him was incredibly easy.