Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc takes pole in Baku for third year in a row
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Ferrari's Charles Leclerc clocked a fastest lap of 1min 40.203sec.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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BAKU – Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc relished in a pleasant surprise to be “back on top” as he took pole position in Baku for the third year in a row in qualifying for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix on Friday.
The pole, in a session twice red flagged due to crashes, was Ferrari’s first of the Formula One season and ended Red Bull’s run of three in succession.
Leclerc clocked a fastest lap of 1min 40.203sec, 0.188 ahead of Red Bull’s championship leader Max Verstappen,
Qualifying for the main race on Sunday will now take place on Fridays for venues with sprint races, after a new format was agreed unanimously by teams earlier this week.
Drivers will have another “shoot-out” qualifying on Saturday for a standalone 100km sprint race
“It feels good... It’s good to be back on top. But for sure, I’m surprised. And at the end, we are on pole, so it’s a good surprise,” said Leclerc.
“We must not forget that our car is probably behind the Red Bull, so it’s going to be difficult to keep the lead. But that’s the target (winning the race).
“Really happy with the lap. It’s a really challenging weekend for us drivers because there’s very little time to practise, one FP1 and then we need to be straight on it (qualifying).
“But the pace (of the car) seems strong.”
He will be wary that for the last two years he was on pole, the race winners were Verstappen and Perez.
Red Bull have won the first three races this season, all from pole, with Verstappen winning in Bahrain and Australia while Perez won in Saudi Arabia.
But they will have to start behind Leclerc on Sunday.
Charles Leclerc (centre) will start Sunday’s race ahead of the Red Bull duo of Max Verstappen (left) and Sergio Perez.
PHOTO: REUTERS
“It’s always tough around here to put the whole lap together,” said Verstappen.
“On the second run we tried something different on the out lap which perhaps wasn’t ideal for the lap time at the end. Trying to make everything perfect is not the easiest. But we are P2, we have a very good race car so all in all it’s not bad.
“You want to start ahead but we’ll have to pass one car.”
Perez added: “It was really tricky in Q1 with the amount of red flags we had there.
“I am a bit disappointed to be P3 because I felt I had more in it but my lap wasn’t clean.
“We knew (Ferrari) were going to be very strong and we knew coming here the Ferrari was going to be the biggest threat to us.
“I think Charles has done a tremendous lap.”
The first phase of qualifying was halted with 10 minutes to go after Nyck de Vries took too much speed into turn 3, locked up and speared his AlphaTauri nose first into the barrier.
The session resumed after a 16-minute delay to extract the wrecked car.
Drivers will have another “shootout” qualifying on Saturday for a standalone 100km sprint race later in the day.
PHOTO: AFP
Alpine’s Pierre Gasly started the opening session after his mechanics hurriedly replaced the gearbox and power unit following a fire in practice but any joy was shortlived.
The Frenchman had the red flags waving for the second time, triggering another delay, when he also hit the wall at turn 3 with 7min 30sec to go.
“I’m sorry, I locked the fronts,” said Gasly, who qualified 19th, over the radio.
Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz will start in fourth at the tricky Baku City Circuit on Sunday, ahead of Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton and Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso.
McLaren’s Lando Norris, AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda, Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll and McLaren’s Oscar Piastri are the others in the top 10. REUTERS, AFP
