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Oscar Piastri won the Azerbaijan
Grand Prix, securing a second victory in what are still the very early days
of his Formula 1 career. McLaren’s Australian driver took the chequered flag
ahead of Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) after the pair had duelled almost all
race long. George Russell made it to the third step of the podium, the
Mercedes driver inheriting the position after Carlos Sainz (Ferrari) and
Sergio Perez (Red Bull) collided on the penultimate lap, causing the only
neutralisation of the afternoon, the race ending under the Virtual Safety
Car.
Piastri picked up 25 points today and Lando Norris brought home 13, which
means McLaren now leads the Constructors’ championship, the first time the
Woking-based team has done so since the opening round of the 2014 season in
Australia.
THE DAY ON
TRACK:
The majority of drivers (14) opted to start on the Medium tyre. The Hard was
chosen by Lando Norris (McLaren), Alexander Albon (Williams), Daniel
Ricciardo (Racing Bulls), Zhou Guanyu (Sauber) and both Alpine drivers (Ocon
and Gasly). As expected, the one-stop strategy proved the most effective in
terms of tyre management: only two drivers, Stroll and Verstappen, pitted
twice, but in these cases the stops were not for strategic reasons: The
Canadian had a puncture as a result of a collision with Tsunoda on the
opening lap and the Dutchman pitted again because he tried to set the race
fastest lap in the closing stages, able to come down pit lane without losing
position.
The longest stint of all was driven by Pierre Gasly (Alpine), who completed
50 laps on the Hard, only pitting on the penultimate lap to switch to Softs.
As for the Medium, Alex Albon made the most use of it, doing a long 20 lap
second stint on the C4.
MARIO ISOLA - MOTORSPORT DIRECTOR
"A fortnight on from the Italian Grand Prix, we have been treated to another
really thrilling race, with the outcome unclear from the first lap to the
last. In Monza we saw two different strategies in play, but today, almost
everyone went with the same choice, but in no way did that detract from the
on-track action, with a long three way fight for the lead, as well as
several others battles throughout the race.
“For this weekend and indeed the next one, we have gone with the same choice
of dry compounds, which worked as expected, adapting very well to the track
characteristics and conditions. Going into the event, the Soft was clearly
going to be a qualifying tyre and the Hard the quickest for the race, with
the Medium as a great compromise for the first part of the race: between
yesterday and today we saw those predictions confirmed.
“Even today, the track continued to rubber-in. It meant the lap times
continued to improve and degradation was pretty limited. A few drivers
experienced graining, especially in the first stint, but it did not
significantly affect their performance. Clearly, running in traffic made
life complicated in terms of tyre management, but that is pretty much
inevitable with the current aerodynamic configuration of these cars."
FORMULA 2
A bittersweet win for Richard Verschoor in the Feature Race. The Dutch
Trident team driver came out on top in a race that was interrupted
immediately because of a spectacular accident at the start. Fortunately, no
one was injured, but the race distance was reduced from 29 to 17 laps. The
Italian team dedicated the win to its owner, Maurizio Salvadori on the day
that his son Luca was tragically killed in a motorcycle race.
Also on the podium were Victor Martins (ART Grand Prix) and Kimi Antonelli
(Prema Racing) while thanks to finishing fourth this morning and taking the
extra point for the fastest race lap, Brazil’s Gabriel Bortoleto (Invicta
Racing) has moved into the championship lead, 4.5 points ahead of France’s
Isack Hadjar (Campos Racing) who left Azerbaijan with no points this
weekend.
It is difficult to evaluate the performance of the two compounds Pirelli
chose for this round because of the reduced race distance and the arrival of
the Safety Car with two minutes remaining of the time allowed for the race.
For the start, only three drivers chose the Soft, with the rest of the field
going with the Supersoft, which allowed them to push for almost all the
first half of the reduced race distance.
COMING UP NEXT FOR OUR TYRES
Next week, Formula 1 is back in action in Singapore for the 18th round of
the longest season in the sport’s history. However, before that, there’s an
early nod to the 2026 season in Barcelona (Spain) on Tuesday, 17th and
Wednesday, 18th September. The Barcelona-Catalunya circuit will host the
debut test of the first prototype tyres built to the new technical
regulations – still 18” but slightly narrower than the current ones. Aston
Martin is supporting Pirelli for this test, with a car adapted to take the
new size of tyre. Driving duties for the two days are entrusted to the
Brazilian, Felipe Drugovich.
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