Leclerc on Pole in Baku: Can Ferrari Finally Break Through at the Azerbaijan GP?
After a week break, we close off the European leg of the 2024 season and we return back to the action at the City of Wind and the Land of Fire in Baku for the Azerbaijan GP.
Big news this week was that Adrian Newey signed for Aston Martin as a part share holder and a hefty contract for him to start working on the 2026 car as he won’t be able to do many changes for the 2025 car given that development would have already started for next year. The other news is that Oliver Bearman will have his 2nd race in F1 this season as he will be driving for Haas instead of Kevin Magnussen due to the race ban he got due to the 12 penalty points he has received in the last 12 months. The other interesting bit of news we heard is that McLaren announced that Oscar Piastri will be backing Lando Norris for the Drivers Championship and hopefully for McLaren, this is not a bit too late given that they didn’t intervene earlier this year.
Heading now into the action on track and in FP1 and it is worth noting that this will be Franco Colapinto’s first time driving around Baku. Once the session starts, we immediately hear Piastri say that the grip is very low on track, and this will be due to all the dust on track which will be being cleaned slowly as the sessions go by this weekend. His teammate Norris reports on the radio that he is finding it super easy to turn right and much harder to turn left which might mean that there is an issue with his power steering.
10 minutes into the session we also hear Lewis Hamilton come on the radio saying his seat is feeling hot again and it seems that Mercedes haven’t yet fixed this issue from Monza but it appears that it is not something that they can fix as they said that this is a trade-off for having to run the car lower to go quicker. Talking about running the car low, we go back to Piastri where he says that the car is bottoming out quite a lot and it is not that straight forward to drive at this stage of the weekend. Also having issues with the car was Lance Stroll as 12 minutes into the session he comes on saying that ‘This is not a car’ and was sounding quite frustrated as the car was handling poorly.
And 13 minutes in we see a Red Flag come out which at first was quite confusing as there was no one stopped on track but then we see a Marshall run on track and picking up a piece of metal which was a good spot by them as this could have been quite bad if a car picked it up with one of their wheels and getting a puncture or throwing it onto an other car behind. This seemed to have come off Colapinto’s car as later in the pits it seemed to have a panel missing. After the session restarts, we hear Esteban Ocon come on the radio saying he has no power and has a problem as we see him limping back to the pits which might be a hydraulic issue as he was stuck on 3rd gear. Unfortunately for Ocon this was the end of the session for him.
Talking of session ending, mid-way through the session we the Red Flag return as we cut to a shot of Charles Leclerc in the barriers at Turn 15 as Leclerc reports that he took the outside line and had lower grip due to the dirt. Luckily damage didn’t seem too bad as it was only the front corner which shouldn’t be an issue to get the car ready for FP2 however the Ferrari mechanics needed to wait till after the session to get the car as they weren’t able to get the car to the pits while it was under Red Flag conditions. Session restarts with 25 minutes left and with 18 minutes left on the session we see the Red Flag once more as we Franco Colapinto stopped on track at Turn 4 as he goes in a bit too fast into the corner and loses the rear and he does go rear first into the barriers which might be an issue for Williams as they will need to ensure that the gearbox is not damaged.
Session restarted with 11 minutes left to go and the remainder of the running seemed to be all good apart from some drivers going wide into Turns 1 and 3 as drivers take to the escape road but this was something that we saw happening through all of FP1. At the end we see Max Verstappen topping the leaderboard followed by Lewis Hamilton and Sergio Perez in FP1 as Verstappen takes the fastest time of the session on his last lap under the chequered flag.
In FP2 we do get going and Leclerc comes on the radio reporting something similar as Lando in FP1 as he was asking the team to check the data about the steering as it is easier to turn right and hard to turn left. Team says everything seems fine but a few laps later, Leclerc comes on the radio saying that it is impossible that they can’t see it in the data and that he won’t drive the car like that as he makes it back to the pits as he believes that there is something wrong. This could be some damage on the steering rack from his crash in FP1.
At Mercedes we see that George Russell has not yet come out on track as Mercedes are changing his engine as a precautionary measure due to an oil sample they got after FP1 so Russell will miss out on half the session for sure. At Red Bull we hear Max Verstappen saying that the car is understeering in the Apex so there is some teething issues at Red Bull as well. Colapinto at Williams missed out on the first 15 minutes as the mechanics were still working on his car to fix it but makes it out on track with 45 minutes left in FP2. At the same time we see some yellow flags on track as Verstappen had a moment as he locks up going into Turn 5 and stops just ahead of the barriers but had to reverse a bit to get back going.
35 minutes left we see a close call between Pierre Gasly and Lando Norris as we see Norris on a fast lap and Gasly was on an outlap as we see them getting very clos on Turn 17 as Gasly tries to get out of the way but it is very tough in Turn 17 and Norris had to take evasive actions not to crash, but Gasly comes on saying he had battery issues which might explain why he wasn’t able to get out the way. Colapinto towards the end had another brush with the wall in Castle corner but luckily, he didn’t get any damage and was able to keep going. At the end of FP2 we see Charles Leclerc topping the charts followed by Sergio Perez and Lewis Hamilton in FP2.
Baku GP 2024: Leclerc's Fourth Pole, Piastri Shines, and Norris Faces Uphill Battle
Looking now at the Saturday session and start with FP3 the final practice session ahead of qualifying and we see Sergio Perez first out on track but reports that the track is a bit damp as it was raining earlier on the day and after one exploration lap he goes back into the pits. 15 minutes into the session and we still don’t have a timed lap from anyone and as soon as Norris was gearing up and started a fast lap we see a yellow flag come out in sector 3 as Esteban Ocon was stopped on track and quickly the yellow flags turn into a red flag and we hear Ocon on the radio saying he has a problem and couldn’t limp back to the pits and after a replay we hear his engine lose power on the outlap. This was reported to be due to a faulty fuel pump.
Session restarts and while Piastri was out on track he reports that there is a few drops of rain, but the team quickly report that they can’t see it impacting the track conditions at this time. With 27 minutes left we see another yellow flag come out as we see Ollie Bearman in Turn 1 who has gone into the barriers and the yellow quickly changes to a red flag again. After a replay we see that Bearman was coming in too fast into Turn 1 and once he realised that he won’t make the corner, we see him try to bail out, but it was a bit too late and hits the front left and broke the suspension.
Session restarts 5 minutes later and drivers don’t waste any time, and they get back on track as no one really had had any time to properly run their plans in FP3 due to the disruptions. With 12 minutes left on the clock, Russell comes on to his team asking them to check the Power Unit as something was feeling strange, however we do see him back out on track with some fresh softs after the team gave the engine a quick check. After an outlap we do see Russell take to the runoff in Turn 3 as he locks up a but and comes back on the radio saying the ride wasn’t feeling the best at that time.
With 3 minutes left we see another close call this time between Sergio Perez and Carlos Sainz at Turn 15 as Sainz was on a fast lap and Perez didn’t manage to get out of the way and Sainz locked up a bit and had to cut the corner to avoid a collision with Perez. At the end of FP3 we see Russell on top of the leaderboard followed by Charles Leclerc and Lando Norris. Leclerc got a reprimand after the session as during one of the yellow flags he didn’t slow down enough and also improved his time. Luckily for Leclerc this won’t be a grid drop for him on Sunday.
Heading now to one of the main sessions of the weekend as track position here is very important and all drivers will be doing their best to get a good spot in qualifying. In Q1 it was all business as usual mainly but we do see Bearman having a moment in Q1 as he had a big slide but manages to keep it out of the barriers and Sainz had a few moments as well as he went off into the run off 2 times in Turns 1 & 2 for not braking in time which caused some yellow flags. On the last flying lap we also see Max Verstappen brushing his rear wheel with the barriers at Turn 15 as he was pushing to get a better time given that he was in P12 at the time, and everyone seemed to be improving. At the end of Q1 we end up losing Daniel Ricciardo, Lando Norris, Valtteri Bottas, Zhou Guanyu and Esteban Ocon. The big callout was Norris as on his last flying lap he had to back off due to yellow flags from Ocon. He will have a massive job tomorrow to try and keep pushing Verstappen for the drivers’ championship.
In Q2 there was no notable events apart from the great pace from the Williams as both drivers make it into Q3 and in Q2 we end up losing Ollie Bearman, Yuki Tsunoda, Pierre Gasly, Nico Hulkenberg and Lance Stroll. Bearman just misses out on Q3, but he does outqualify his teammate Hulkenberg which is quite impressive from the rookie. Heading now into Q3 we see the first runs and it was Ferrari who are looking to be the ones to beat as Charles Leclerc takes provisional pole followed by Carlos Sainz and Oscar Piastri. After the first runs we hear Lewis Hamiton asking how far behind he is which Bono responds that he is 8 and a half tenths to Leclerc which Hamilton responds to ask the team to get those temperatures up.
When drivers started coming out for the last runs in Q3 Piastri comes on the radio saying that the Williams still has a fan connected to the airbox connected to it and Alex Albon’s car did in fact have this fan connected to the airbox, Albon is stuck at pit exit and has managed to get the fan off himself and threw it off the car to get going again. Albon lost some time and due to this didn’t manage to make it to the line in time. He was noted though for an unsafe release, this will be investigated after the session. Charles Leclerc takes pole position for the 4th time in a row at Baku and he is followed by Oscar Piastri, Carlos Sainz, Sergio Perez, George Russell, Max Verstappen, Lewis Hamilton, Fernando Alonso, Franco Colapinto and Alex Albon form the Top 10. Pierre Gasly after the session was disqualified from Qualifying due to exceeding fuel mass flow, he will be starting in last place.
Who do you think will come out on top tomorrow in the race? Will Charles Leclerc manage to convert this pole to a win for the first time in Baku? Will Norris be able to make up some good places to get back into the points from now 16th since Gasly was disqualified? Tune in tomorrow to find out.
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