Charles Leclerc claimed the Formula 1 sprint pole position at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, overcoming a late drama with the wall to beat Sergio Perez and Max Verstappen.
A time of one minute, 41.697 seconds from Leclerc amid the first runs in the eight-minute SQ3 session proved unassailable, and a second set of laps from both Perez and Verstappen could not topple the Ferrari’s driver searing pace around the Baku circuit.
The Red Bull duo was especially keen to be first out in the final part of qualifying, sitting at the pitlane exit for a few minutes between sessions, and immediately began proceedings with the initial headline efforts.
Perez posted a one minute, 41.876 seconds to go top, and Verstappen was unable to beat his team-mate’s effort having complained that he “lost all the rear in the middle sector”.
Leclerc reprised his form from Friday and fired his Ferrari across the line with a one minute, 41.697 seconds to sit on top of the order, once again throwing down the gauntlet to the Red Bull duo.
Although Perez began to hit back, setting the best middle sector time of the session and threatening to usurp Leclerc, he was unable to make the difference in the final sector and crossed the line 0.15 seconds shy of Leclerc’s benchmark.
Attempting to better his own time, Leclerc then gave the Ferrari garage a scare by putting his Ferrari into the barrier at Turn 5, but only damaged his front wing and was able to back it out of the wall – compromising team-mate Carlos Sainz’s lap in the process.
Verstappen improved his time but was unable to claim any ground on Leclerc and Perez, and will thus start the sprint race from third on the grid.
With Sainz unable to make any gains, George Russell moved past the Spanish driver to claim fourth on the grid for the shortened Saturday race. His team-mate Lewis Hamilton starts from sixth, alongside Sainz on the third row.
Having carried his Williams all the way to SQ3, Alex Albon will start the sprint from seventh ahead of Fernando Alonso, who was suffering amid continued DRS issues at Aston Martin. Lance Stroll was ninth quickest, while Lando Norris could not run in SQ3 having no sets of soft tyres left.
The rules dictate that a fresh set of softs must be used, but McLaren decided to sacrifice a potential SQ3 outing on Friday and employed that set during his Q3 lap, giving him seventh on the grid for Sunday’s race.
Oscar Piastri was unable to progress to the final part of qualifying, despite getting into the top 10 late on in SQ2 with a lap 0.03 seconds shy of team-mate Norris.
But Stroll received a tow from Alonso in a showing of great teamwork among the Aston Martins, slingshotting the Canadian into the top ten at Piastri’s expense.
Nico Hulkenberg overcame a near-miss with the wall at Turn 7, where he sustained a lock-up at the front, to shuffle up to P12 as Haas did not have the pace to provide a concerted challenge for SQ3.
Esteban Ocon could only go P13 in a difficult session for the Alpine squad, albeit three tenths clear of Kevin Magnussen.
With 30 seconds left on the clock of SQ1, Logan Sargeant hit the wall at Turn 15 to effectively freeze the order for the opening 12 minutes of running, breaking the right rear corner of his Williams in the process.
Sargeant had been P11, but could take no further part in the session given the extent of the damage – the American citing that the “Ferraris were in the middle of the road” on the exit of the Old City section.
This denied the Alfa Romeos of Zhou Guanyu and Valtteri Bottas a chance to break out of the bottom five. But the timing of the red flag was more cruel for Yuki Tsunoda, who had qualified in the top ten for Sunday’s Grand Prix, and was on course to better his lap before the session was stopped as he was on the final straight.
Pierre Gasly entered the pits after his initial runs, and thus could do no better than 19th on the grid – and was only spared from the bottom of the pile by Nyck de Vries. The Dutchman endured a troubled run, once more going deep at Turn 3 – but this time, avoided the wall and managed to reverse out.
Azerbaijan Grand Prix, sprint qualifying:
1 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 1:41.697
2 Sergio Perez Red Bull 1:41.844
3 Max Verstappen Red Bull 1:41.987
4 George Russell Mercedes 1:42.252
5 Carlos Sainz Ferrari 1:42.287
6 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:42.502
7 Alex Albon Williams 1:42.846
8 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin 1:43.010
9 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 1:43.064
10 Lando Norris McLaren No time
11 Oscar Piastri McLaren 1:43.427
12 Nico Hulkenberg Haas 1:43.806
13 Esteban Ocon Alpine 1:44.088
14 Kevin Magnussen Haas 1;44.332
15 Logan Sargeant Williams No time
16 Zhou Guanyu Alfa Romeo 1:45.177
17 Valtteri Bottas Alfa Romeo 1;45.352
18 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri 1:45.436
19 Pierre Gasly Alpine 1;46.951
20 Nyck de Vries AlphaTauri 1:48.180
Sprint qualifying review as reported by Formula1.com.
Charles Leclerc topped the first ever Sprint Shootout and ensured pole for Saturday afternoon’s Sprint, ahead of the Red Bulls of Sergio Perez and Max Verstappen.
In a dramatic conclusion to qualifying for the Sprint, Leclerc hit the barriers – but he had already set the benchmark of 1m 41.697s to take Sprint pole. Perez improved but could only manage second for the Shootout while Verstappen struggled for grip and took P3 for the Sprint.
The medium tyre was mandatory for the first and second sessions of qualifying – SQ1 and SQ2 – while teams had to fit a new set of softs for SQ3.
In SQ3, George Russell managed P4 for Mercedes but Carlos Sainz was compromised by his team mate’s crash and rounded out the top five ahead of Lewis Hamilton in sixth.
Alex Albon was seventh on the board for Williams, ahead of the Aston Martins of Fernando Alonso in P8 and Lance Stroll in P9 – both suffering from DRS issues that carried over from Friday qualifying. Lando Norris rounded out the top 10 having sat out SQ3 without a new set of softs.
In SQ2, drivers had 10 minutes to set times and it was Verstappen who led the Ferraris. In the second segment of the Shootout, McLaren’s Oscar Piastri was eliminated in P11 ahead of Nico Hulkenberg (Haas) in P12. Esteban Ocon took P13 for Alpine and Magnussen was left 14th. Logan Sargeant qualified a provisional P15 for the Sprint but the Williams driver had crashed in SQ1.
The 12-minute SQ1 saw Leclerc, who took pole for Sunday’s Grand Prix in a Friday qualifying session, top the board ahead of Verstappen – while Sargeant crashed out at Turn 15 to end the session prematurely. Sargeant’s crash led to the elimination of both Alfa Romeos – Zhou Guanyu qualifying a provisional 16th and Valtteri Bottas 17th – plus a furious Yuki Tsunoda.
Pierre Gasly couldn’t put down a proper time and ended up 19th while Nyck de Vries, who crashed out of Q1 on Friday, qualified a provisional P20 for the Sprint having made an error at Turn 3 in SQ1.
https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/article.leclerc-leads-red-bulls-in-first-ever-sprint-shootout-despite-crashing-in.5BcxDeCtEpIMb1iHkeIkmA.html
Charles Leclerc says pushing too hard to make up for a drop-off in performance on the soft tyres triggered his late crash in Formula 1’s sprint shootout qualifying in Baku.
The Ferrari driver had been at the top of the timesheets after the first run in the final SQ3 session, before drivers completed a cool-down lap and went for a second effort.
But with the best performance having been taken out of the mandatory softs, Leclerc said that with his second effort being slower in the first sector, he went too far in trying to recover time.
“The soft was a little bit tricky because you get in Q3 and we haven’t driven on these tyres since yesterday,” said Leclerc, who still managed to keep hold of his sprint pole slot despite the accident.
“It’s not a long time ago, but the conditions are very different so it was behaving much differently. The rear overheated on the second lap.
“I tried to push a bit more to gain some lap time, as I was behind my first best lap time, and I lost it in Turn 5. But in the end it doesn’t have any consequence on qualifying.
“I don’t know about Carlos behind me, so it’s a shame if he was improving, but I’m happy with the first lap, very happy with the first lap. And now we have to confirm that in the race.”
https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/leclerc-f1-sprint-shootout-crash-triggered-by-soft-tyre-drop-off/10462337/
George Russell says his surprise fourth spot for Baku’s sprint race has left Mercedes scratching its head over why its Formula 1 car seems to get quicker as weekends progress.
The Briton had a frustrating time in Friday qualifying at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix as a mistake on his final Q2 run left him knocked out of the session and down in 11th on the grid.
But, without having been allowed to change car settings much because of parc ferme rules, Russell was able to put in a much more competitive performance as he grabbed a place on the second row in Saturday morning’s sprint shootout qualifying session.
Reflecting on the encouraging sprint shootout pace, Russell admitted that there was some annoyance because it proved what he should have been able to do on Friday.
However, it further highlighted that Mercedes needs to get to the bottom of just why the W14 seems to only come into its element late on in the weekends and especially in Q3.
“I’ve mixed feelings,” admitted Russell. “I’m very happy with the job in qualifying and I think P4 is exceeding our expectations. But when I got back into the pitlane I was like: bugger!
“I still made that mistake yesterday and this shows what was probably possible, but you can’t always be on your A-game.
“But it’s an interesting one. We always seem to get better as qualifying progresses, we always sort of come into our own come Q3 and as the weekend progresses, so there’s something to learn there.”
https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/russell-mercedes-seeking-answers-over-q3-quirk-with-2023-f1-car/10462381/