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Sebastian Vettel claimed Pole position for tomorrow's Azerbaijan Grand Prix ahead of Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas. It's the first time anyone other than Mercedes have claimed Pole position at the Baku street circuit and will go a long way towards claiming a potential third win of the season for the four time world champion.
The closest challengers to Vettel on Sunday should be the Mercedes cars of Hamilton and Bottas but it was a case of what could have been for Vettel's Ferrari teammate Kimi Raikkonen. The Finn made two high profile errors, first in Q2 where he flat spotted his tyres on his only run on super soft tyres, meaning he will be the only car in the top six starting on the ultra softs.
He then threw away a potential pole position, having gone quickest through the first two sectors on his final lap he made a mistake in the final sector, handing pole position to his teammate and leaving himself in a lowly sixth position.
The Red Bulls of Ricciardo and Verstappen claimed fourth and fifth respectively, showing they still don't quite have the pace to challenge the Mercedes and Ferrari's in qualifying but on a heavily power dependent track to have both cars less than half a second away is a good effort from the Milton Keynes marque and will be hoping to challenge for race victory tomorrow.
It was a better session than most this season for Force India who managed to have the fastest car of the midfield today grabbing seventh and eighth on the grid in an impressive performance to beat both Renaults who locked out the fifth row of the grid before Nico Hulkenberg's grid penalty which will relegate him down to 14th.
Another team who had an impressive session were Williams, managing to qualify 11th and 12th with Lance Stroll a whisker away from getting into the top 10 shootout but with both drivers bumped up a position thanks to Nico Hulkenberg's penalty, the team will be optimistic to score their first points of the season.
It was a bad session for Haas and Toro Rosso however, with Romain Grosjean unable to set a lap time owing to a gearbox issue and Magnussen unable to get any higher than 15th, whilst Toro Rosso almost spectacularly came together which ruined both drivers chances of getting out of Q1 and capping a difficult weekend thus far.
Sam Gale
Baku City Circuit - 28 April 2018
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Replies (10)
Login to replyKean
Posts: 692
I think Leclerc is beginning to feel more comfortable, likely this is just the beginning of him putting in impressive performances. McLaren disappoints yet again, a full second off the pace of the Renaults. Also impressed by Ocon the entire weekend so far, seems like SFI (and Williams for that matter) are making good use of the Merc PU down those long straights.
calle.itw
Posts: 8,527
Im interested to see how Leclerc will develop. I feel that he could be more of a real deal compared to some of the other more recent additions. And speaking of newer additions: agree, Ocon continues to impress me. As for Williams... Seeing as they are Williams, with a Merc' engine, this shouldnt be an impressive record really, even with bad/inexperienced drivers on board.
As for McLaren... Am I the only one who think they arent doing too badly, considering this is their first year with a new PU that wasnt much faster than their old unit, considering they enter this season with much less cash to play with, considering their car is very draggy and doesnt suit this track, and considering they are up against a works team and Red Bull f*ing racing son? But I guess thats what they get when they ask for hype when they need patience.
RogerF1
Posts: 501
Quite chuffed to see the ‘quiet’ Williams crowd get one over on McLaren, hope they can carry that through the race.
calle.itw
Posts: 8,527
Disappointed by Kimi's performance and by STR's I dont know what that was. Looks like it might become a running gag this season...
TimberVD
Posts: 42
McLaren have got absolutely nowhere to hide now. They are even behind the Williams and for Vandoorne behind a Sauber. McLaren in crisis for sure. Don't care if there is another PU behind them, with their engineering prowess they shouldn't have any issues. They have made a terrible mistake somewhere. Their answer that the issues are from a lack of testing is more PR spin. It doesn't take until the Spanish GP to sort that out.
RogerF1
Posts: 501
Yep, I think Alonso is their talisman like Massa was for Williams. If they had two Rookies in the seat they would be woeful.
calle.itw
Posts: 8,527
Its definitely not the McLaren we all used to cherish. But it hasnt been for several years now, so go figure I guess. It went downhill from 2013 and onwards, and maybe not even a new Merc' deal could save them. Looking at Williams for reference.
TimberVD
Posts: 42
In the race is where Alonso shines. He could wrangle and wrestle that Honda PU to some impressive things. Seems it's perhaps the other way now, engine is fine, chassis isn't. You've got to respect the skills of the guy. The rookies don't stand a chance in the race even with better machinery. Sly old fox.
calle.itw
Posts: 8,527
Nah, Im not sure it was as good as they claimed last year, and I dont think its bad this year, it just was and is far too specialized. a high aero chassis will never be good at tracks like Baku or Gilles Villeneuve's circuit.
RogerF1
Posts: 501
Getting quite interesting with Williams, Sauber, Hass & STR (to an extent) all pepping up and with SFI having a good day as well mid field and tail end getting really competitive and the gap is not so wide, only really 1 sec across the whole of the potential of the 2nd half of the grid.