Charles Leclerc hailed the "incredible" Sebastian Vettel as he revealed a touching gesture from the German before they even worked together.
Vettel spent two years of his remarkable Formula 1 career driving alongside Leclerc at Ferrari. But it was a few years before that when he first got in touch with the Monegasque with a gesture which left a long-lasting impression.
The German's final F1 race took place last month, at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. Like every other driver on the grid, Leclerc took the opportunity prior to that race to pay tribute to the four-time world champion – and told the anecdote about a letter he once received from him.
Before he made it to F1, he was racing with Prema in the 2017 F2 championship. At the same time, he was fulfilling his duties as part of the Ferrari Driver Academy, which involved plenty of time on the simulator at their Maranello base to help the team to develop their cars.
While that sort of work behind the scenes often goes unnoticed, Leclerc revealed that Vettel once went out of his way to make sure he knew just how much all that work on the simulator was appreciated.
"He’s been incredible," Leclerc said of his former team-mate. "I remember, already in Formula 2, I was doing the simulator work, which, okay, it's not easy work to do. It's really, really tiring, and I thought that Seb probably didn't even know I was on the simulator.
"And I received a letter one day, just thanking me for all the hard work. And that meant a lot for me at that time. He will definitely be missed. I'm sure that he will enjoy his time off the racetrack, and that he will find other things that makes him happy."
Their relationship as Ferrari team-mates was not always a smooth one. They had a couple of infamous on-track clashes during the 2019 and 2020 seasons, while it is believed that part of the reason behind Vettel's decision to leave the team was because Leclerc had become the main man in the Ferrari garage.
"We became team-mates in 2019 and 2020 also, where he really taught me a lot," added the Monegasque of their time together. "We've had our tense moments on track, but the respect off the track has never changed and he's always been there for me whenever I had difficult times.
"That was very different to what I was used to with my previous team-mates. Obviously, in Formula 1 it's normal, there's inner competition inside the team but he has always been super caring and trying to help me whenever I was going through more difficult times."
