Charles Leclerc’s music went from hobby to vital — and popular — ‘off switch’

For all the roaring engines and on-track fury, Formula One is a sport built upon subtleties. The factors that feed into deciding who climbs the podium and who loses their seat — the novel training methods, the last-minute strategy calls, even the more nutritious food — are rarely on full display. The Athletic’s new F1 coverage is designed to throw light on all of them, and that’s what we’ll be doing in Untold Stories. Follow along as we take you beyond the headlines (and the headliners) to understand how teams and drivers climb the pinnacle of motorsports.

Charles Leclerc never expected his piano playing to go beyond a simple hobby and develop into a vital form of escapism.

Ferrari Formula One driver played when he was a child and always had an interest in music. But when the Covid-19 pandemic put the F1 season on hold, Leclerc began to take the instrument more seriously.

“It’s just something that I really enjoyed doing whenever I was coming back from the races,” Leclerc told The Athletic. “It helped me disconnect from racing. Then I took some lessons during the pandemic because I didn’t have much to do.”

His attention naturally returned to F1 once the season resumed after a four-month delay, but whenever he had a spare 10 or 15 minutes at home, he’d spend it playing, finding it an effective way to switch his mind off from thinking about racing. As he put it, he “became obsessed with it.”

That obsession snowballed. By the end of the year, a crane was lifting a white Steinway upright piano into Leclerc’s Monaco apartment, allowing him to take his passion more seriously.

. @Charles_Leclerc Instagram Update

A new piano for Charles today 😄#F1 #Charles16 pic.twitter.com/hWPpvyEDkJ

— Charles Leclerc Fan Page (@LeclercNews) December 16, 2020

And in April, he officially became a musician, at least by Spotify and iTunes’ standards, when he released his debut single. “AUS23 (1:1)” reached #6 on the iTunes charts. By late May, it had 4.2 million plays on Spotify.

“It’s actually performing really well!” Leclerc said shortly after its release. “I’m surprised, but it’s good.”

A vital escape

The real upside has nothing to do with the song’s popularity. Finding time to decompress can be difficult through the intensity of life as a Formula One driver and a packed schedule of races, training and events.

But more and more drivers are sharing their outside pursuits with the wider world. Valtteri Bottas is working on both coffee and gin brands. Lewis Hamilton is heavily involved in fashion, helping design a line with Tommy Hilfiger. Lando Norris has set up his own gaming brand and is a prolific streamer.

Leclerc hadn’t expected to go public with his music so soon. In a 2021 episode of F1’s Beyond the Grid podcast, Leclerc said he was “a bit too shy to show my skills to the big public yet.” The push to release the song came after he teased part of it to his 11 million Instagram followers and received a wave of positive messages and praise. Deciding he wanted to “make it easier for fans to enjoy my music,” he got help from a management company, Verdigris, which looks after artists including Jungle and Hot Chip, to get it on various platforms.

“AUS23 (1:1)” debuted shortly after the Australian Grand Prix; the title follows Ferrari’s internal name for the race weekend. The black-and-white cover art shows Leclerc’s hands at a piano, and the instrumental pairs the piano notes with a violin that he added himself using production software. He said it “didn’t take much time” to put together.

One day after the Miami Grand Prix at the start of this month, Leclerc released his second single, “MIA23 (1:2)”, another piano/violin instrumental. He said he’ll make and share more songs when he gets time. Leclerc’s releases are proving popular with close to a million monthly listeners on Spotify.

In April, Leclerc officially became a musician, at least by Spotify and iTunes’ standards, when he released his debut single “AUS23 (1:1).” (Dan Mullan – Formula 1/Formula 1 via Getty Images)

Leclerc cites a mix of inspirations, but the strings and piano influence is a throughline.“Hans Zimmer is probably one of my favorites,” he said. “Coldplay, I love.” In a quick-fire interview with ESPN last year, Leclerc was asked who he would swap lives with for a day if he had the chance. His answer was Coldplay lead singer Chris Martin.

Leclerc is not the only F1 driver with a musical side. Hamilton has been producing his own music for years but has not released any publicly. In 2018, he appeared on Christina Aguilera’s song “Pipe” under the name XNDA, singing the bridge, but only confirmed it was him two years later.

Leclerc said in Baku that it would be fun to work with Hamilton on something, but so long as the Mercedes driver was happy to sing on a sad song, joking his are “not the happiest ones.”

But Charles Leclerc, the musician, is still very much a second life to Charles Leclerc, the driver. Through race weekends, he remains focused on his duties with Ferrari as the team looks to get back in the fight against Red Bull and give Leclerc a chance to fight for wins again.

“I’m still fully a driver,” he said. “I just do (music) from pure passion.”

The “Untold Stories” series is part of a partnership with Michelob ULTRA. The Athletic maintains full editorial independence. Partners have no control over or input into the reporting or editing process and do not review stories before publication.

(Lead image: Dan Mullan/Getty Images,
Felicia Buitenwerf/Unsplash; Design: Eamon Dalton)