Motorsports Racing News & Blog Articles

Christian Horner felt both Sergio Pérez and Max Verstappen got as much out of their RB18’s as they could during Qualifying for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix on Saturday, even though both were beaten to pole position by Scuderia Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.

A refuelling issue for Pérez ahead of his final run in Q3 left him out of position on track and without a valuable tow down the lengthy start/finish straight at the Baku City Circuit, but despite this he was able to put in a lap good enough for second on the grid.

Verstappen had a more straightforward session but was unable to better third on the grid.  However, Horner, the Team Principal of the Milton Keynes-based team, reckons it was a good performance from both drivers amid tricky conditions and in between red and yellow flags.

“It’s always tricky to navigate through the sessions here with plenty of incidents and yellow flags, but both drivers extracted every last bit out of the car in their Q3 runs,” said Horner.  

“Checo had a small issue whilst refuelling before Q3 that caused him to be slightly out of sequence but again, a very strong, clean lap from him to put him second on the grid, with Max incredibly close behind.”

Scuderia Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc came out on top after a dynamic qualifying at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, followed by Red Bull Racing’s Sergio Perez and Max Verstappen. Carlos Sainz rounded out the top four, which was once again locked out by the leading teams.

Q1: Red flag results in dramatic race to the line

The start of Q1 was delayed by fifteen minutes in order to meet the requirement of two hours between Free Practice One and Qualifying, as the earlier practice was delayed to fix the barriers damaged after a last-lap crash in the F2 sprint race. Drivers were queued up in the pit lane and eager to get out on track before the green light was illuminated.   

The championship-contending teams of Ferrari and Red Bull put in competitive laps right away, securing their place in the next round early on. George Russell put in a time of 1:43.781 to slide into fourth, with BWT Alpine F1 Team’s Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso taking sixth and seventh soon after, and Lando Norris taking eighth. Pierre Gasly then joined the top ten with a 1:44.035. Zhou Guanyu later put in an impressive effort for fifth with a 1:43.777 with over eight minutes to go. 

With four minutes left, Lance Stroll had a run straight into the wall at turn 7, which caused a yellow flag and left him with some potential front wing damage. That wasn’t the end of his misfortune, however, as with two and a half minutes to go he had another crash into a wall that left his car heavily damaged. A red flag was brought out, and Stroll was out of qualifying.

As of the red flag, the elimination zone consisted of Alex Albon, Valtteri Bottas, Nicholas Latifi, Lance Stroll and Mick Schumacher. With such little time to spare once running resumed, the drivers at risk scrambled to get to the line in time to put in a final lap. This resulted in a dramatic last few minutes of Q1, but in the end, the only Bottas was able to scrape by and join the advancing drivers with a 1:44.478, knocking out Kevin Magnussen as a result. 

The first hour of the 90th 24 Hours of Le Mans started with chaos for the LMP2s as Toyota Gazoo Racing held a strong one-two at the front of the grid.

Sebastien Buemi led the field over the line as the clock struck 16:00, the five Hypercars pulling into a pack of their own. Both Glickenhaus Racing cars had a better run to the line that the Alpine Elf Team, going either side of Nicolas Lapierre to demote him from third to fifth. It went even worse for the French driver when Robert Kubica came flying passed him in the #9 Prema Orlen Team LMP2 to put him sixth overall, but within a lap and a half Lapierre was back in front.

Buemi was complaining of oversteer at the end of the hour, with Mike Conway reeling him in to take the lead of the race. The duo still run one-two, but now reversed as we go into the second hour.

Will Owen looked to have the edge on Rene Rast in the #31 WRT on the run towards Dunlop, but sadly got trapped in a WRT sandwich with the #41 Realteam by WRT. Rast was deemed to have been at fault as he moved back across the track, believing he was ahead of the United Autosports and bouncing Owen into his team mate. The #22 shot off the track with front nose damage and came to a stop in the gravels on the inside of Dunlop Curve. The car was retrieved from the gravel and made it back to the pits for repairs, but the likely lost about 20 minutes in the incident.

Rast was handede a one minute stop/go penalty for causing the collision.

ART Grand Prix’s Frederik Vesti has become the latest rookie to take the first win of his FIA Formula 2 career after a dramatic Sprint Race at the Baku City Circuit which saw three safety cars in the final seven laps.

PREMA Racing’s Jehan Daruvala led for most of the race after taking the lead from pole-sitter Jake Hughes at Turn 2 of the first lap, but couldn’t keep Vesti behind on the second Safety Car restart after locking up into the first corner. The Indian driver had stretched out a comfortable four second lead on the rest of the field before the first Safety Car on lap fourteen.

Carlin’s Liam Lawson completed the podium in third position after a stellar drive which saw him climb up from ninth place on the grid. His team-mate, Logan Sargeant, occupied the position for most of the race but lost it to Richard Verschoor on the first restart with the Dutch driver finding himself as the latest braker into Turn 1.

The first Safety Car was triggered by an over-zealous Dennis Hauger who absolutely sent it down Théo Pourchaire’s inside at Turn 3. The Norwegian driver, who took his first F2 victory in the last round’s Sprint Race, ended up locking his front-right tyre and couldn’t get the car slowed down enough upon entry which saw him end his race in the barriers.

As soon as the first Safety Car was brought in, it was then deployed again after Charouz Racing System’s Enzo Fittipaldi suffered suspension damage at Turn 2. Sunday’s Feature Race pole-sitter Jüri Vips‘ race was subsequently ruined after he was caught up in Fittipaldi’s trip to the escape road.

Sergio Pérez came out on top in final practice for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix on Saturday, with Qualifying later in the day likely to be a straight battle between Oracle Red Bull Racing and Scuderia Ferrari for pole position.

The top four drivers were separated by just over four-tenths of a second at the Baku City Circuit, with Pérez edging out Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc by 0.070 seconds at the head of the timesheets.

Max Verstappen, who had his final run interrupted by traffic having earlier been forced to abort another lap as Valtteri Bottas went off track at turn three, ended third quickest, just 0.279 seconds back, while Carlos Sainz Jr. in the second Ferrari placed fourth, 0.426 seconds back.

Throughout the session, the four drivers were trading quickest sector times and overall lap times, and if this continues into Qualifying then fans are in for a fantastic battle for pole position.

The start of the session had been delayed due to barrier repairs being undertaken at turn one after they were damaged by a final lap crash in the preceding FIA Formula 2 race, and Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant F1 Team’s Lance Stroll was the first on track, while both the Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team drivers, George Russell and Lewis Hamilton, also went out early.

BWT Alpine F1 Team rounded out a smooth day of running in Baku, with Fernando Alonso and Esteban Ocon finishing in the top ten in both Free Practice One and Free Practice Two of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. Alonso had a particularly impressive day finishing fifth and fourth in the respective sessions, while Ocon took tenth and ninth.

Alpine Sporting Director Alan Permane said that the team’s Friday was a successful one from a technical stand-point, as the upgrades that they had installed proved to function well around the street circuit. Overall, he said that the drivers were pleased with the car aside from some adjustments, and the team has a solid grasp of the car’s behavior.

“We are happy with our work today. We brought some upgrades to Baku and everything seems to be working very well. The drivers are reasonably happy with the cars and there are still improvements to make of course. The two sessions ran as planned, very smoothly. We did our tyre work and have a good understanding on how the car is working, both on high and low fuel. 

Wind conditions are known to change quickly in Baku, which will likely play a role in qualifying and the race alike. Permane cited the wind as an important factor this weekend, as gusts proved to impact drivers in parts of the track. 

“The wind plays a part here, it can be very gusty and can catch the drivers out as we saw a few times especially around the last couple of corners that are very tricky with a tailwind today. It was a steady day and we look forward to qualifying tomorrow.”

Credit: BWT Alpine F1 Team

BWT Alpine F1 Team’s Fernando Alonso was led only by the likes of Red Bull Racing and Scuderia Ferrari by the end of Friday running at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, earning fifth and fourth in Free Practice One and Free Practice Two, respectively. He had also set the fastest sector three time in the second session, further highlighting his pace and A522’s speed on the Baku City Circuit’s lengthy back straight. 

After a “normal” Friday programme, Alonso said that there are a few elements of the set-up that need to be perfected to ensure that the performance found during practice will continue into qualifying.  

“It is always tricky here in Baku with the windy and fast circuit conditions. But I think we had a normal Friday today and we were able to test some of our new items. We still need to optimise a few things on the setup of the car ahead of Qualifying tomorrow. 

“However, we seem fast today, so we’ll work overnight to ensure we keep this sort of pace tomorrow. We seem fast on the straights and it’s sometimes a setup compromise with this type of circuit, but let’s see how we go tomorrow.”  

“Confidence is key around here” – Esteban Ocon

Team-mate Esteban Ocon had a successful Friday’s running ahead of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, finishing Free Practice One tenth on the timesheets and ending the day in ninth after Free Practice Two. The French driver was also fastest in the final sector speed trap in the second session.

While veteran affairs is not the strongest suit of the United States despite the wave of patriotism that sweeps sporting events, the Veterans Racing Alliance aims to give them an opportunity to break into the world of off-road motorsport. The VRA is a new nonprofit organisation founded with the goal of supporting veterans through racing, and its programme includes plans to field cars in desert and short course championships beginning with a pair of cars in the Legacy Racing Association‘s Baja Nevada on 24 June. Another two will race in the MORE GC Lightning Freedom Cup on 2/3 July, followed by the legendary Crandon International Raceway World Championships on 1–5 September.

The project is overseen by retired United States Marine John McMurrin and UTV team owner Tim Fields. In a letter published Friday, McMurrin explained the VRA’s mission is “[t]o introduce veterans to and support veterans in the racing community by being a resource for sponsorship assistance, manpower coordination, and training in all aspects of racing team operations. All while providing the brotherhood/sisterhood, adrenaline therapy, and a new mission for those veterans that have been lacking it since their return to civilian life.”

The goals were outlined with three particular bullet points:

Knowledge and Experience: “The two priceless things in any field. We will be using the experience in the alliance to bring veteran owned race programs to the next level or help where they are having issues. The nonprofit will own a race vehicle as a platform to put veterans new to racing in allowing them to experience and learn all the different tasks involved in racing. This will allow veterans mentoring, access to knowledge, and experience at a fraction of the cost and time it would normally take to gain.”Manpower Coordination: “The alliance is just that, an alliance of veterans and ambassadors that come together for events to help veterans race who would not be able to otherwise due to lack of manpower. VRA leaders will put together a network of manpower resources across the country that can be called on when a veteran needs some help running a race. The group comes together creating a team for that event and then goes back to their own program after. But not only does this help the veteran racing but it brings like-minded local veterans together who may never have met, creating local support networks and friendships.”Sponsorship Assistance: “VRA will reach out, doing work making inroads with companies, pit services, and race organizations, compiling an assistance network with the goal of decreasing the cost of racing and maintaining/building a race vehicle for that veteran. Anyone in the motorsports field knows how hard it can be to get the attention of a potential sponsor. VRA will work to decrease this by putting together a list of companies supporting our mission that will allow us to provide racer discounts or direct introductions to the sponsorship personnel of companies.”

“All along we are building and bringing together veterans creating a brotherhood/sisterhood that those veterans can lean on in their time of need mentally or physically,” continued McMurrin’s letter. “Giving those veterans a new positive mission to work towards even if they don’t own their own race program which provides a purpose in life that could be lacking. While of course, sitting in that race car seat, working that pit to get the car out fast, chasing the race car along the race course… providing a healthy controlled adrenaline therapy.”

The military and off-road racing tend to overlap, which is perhaps not a major surprise as combat vehicles frequently move on various types of terrain besides pavement. Some off-road events also have categories for military vehicles like the prestigious Mint 400 which boasts Vintage and Modern Military classes in its Limited race; personnel of the United States Armed Forces take part in the two divisions, such as the Army’s 5th Special Forces Group (Airborne) in the 2022 edition. Warfighter Made, a charity that provides recreational therapy for veterans, has also fielded entries at the Mint 400 and is a partner of the VRA.

Charles Leclerc reflected on a ‘solid’ first day of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix weekend on Friday, with the Scuderia Ferrari driver ending the afternoon with the fastest overall time.

Leclerc, who sits second in the FIA Formula 1 World Championship Drivers’ standings heading into the weekend at the Baku City Circuit, ended second fastest behind Oracle Red Bull Racing’s Sergio Pérez in the opening session before taking over at the top in the second.

Despite leading the way, Leclerc believes there is still plenty of time to find, with the Monegasque racer believing no one was able to put a completely clean lap together.

“We had a solid first day,” said Leclerc.  “The progression we made from FP1 to FP2 was good and we worked well as a team.

“The lap times are not representative, because no one put a proper lap together in the second session. There is still quite a bit of room for improvement.

The in-form Sergio Pérez led the way in the opening free practice session of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix on Friday, with the Oracle Red Bull Racing driver edging out Charles Leclerc by just over a tenth of a second.

Coming off the back of his first win of the season in Monaco, Pérez once again showed he has the pace to challenge at the front of the pack at the Baku City Circuit, setting a best time of 1:45.476 to lead first practice, although he slipped to second behind Scuderia Ferrari’s Leclerc in the afternoon’s running.

The Mexican, who goes into this weekend with the knowledge of a new two-year extension to his contract with Red Bull, reckons Friday’s running was a good start to the weekend, but he hopes for more from the RB18 on Saturday where he hopes to be challenging for pole position.

“It was a good start to the day but the second session didn’t go as well as we would have liked,” said Pérez.  “We explored some things this afternoon and the results we wanted didn’t come but we have collected good data with both tyres, as well as on the long runs.

“There is a lot to look over this evening and go through to hook it up for qualifying tomorrow. Initially the long run data looks good for the race but there are a lot of details we need to look into more.

Charles Leclerc ended the opening day of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix as fastest, after topping Free Practice Two at the windy Baku City Circuit. The Monegasque topped Friday’s afternoon session after setting a 1:43.224 on the red-walled Soft tyres.

Behind the Scuderia Ferrari driver was both Oracle Red Bull Racing drivers, with Sergio Pérez in second and Max Verstappen in third. Leclerc was +0.248s faster than Pérez, with Verstappen being a further tenth behind. The top three ended the day in a league of their own, with Fernando Alonso who impressed in fourth over +0.9s behind. The Spaniard performed brilliantly on the opening day in Baku, as the double World Champion made the most of BWT Alpine F1 Team’s aerodynamic modifications.

Carlos Sainz Jr has plenty of time to find on Saturday, after ending Friday in fifth-place but crucially a second behind his team-mate. However, Sainz’ time was set on the Medium compound, meaning his true pace is yet to be seen. Pierre Gasly was next in sixth, with George Russell who finished seventh finding himself in a Scuderia AlphaTauri sandwich.

Esteban Ocon was ninth in what was a good opening day for the Frenchman, with Lando Norris in tenth. Lewis Hamilton found himself in an Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant Formula One Team sandwich, with last year’s second-place finisher Sebastian Vettel in eleventh, and Lance Stroll in thirteenth.

Whilst it was Nicholas Latifi who had problems in Free Practice 1, it was Alex Albon who faced difficulties in the second session. The Thai driver sat in the garage for most of the session, after damaging his front-left suspension early on.

After two wins on the streets of Baku last season, Jüri Vips has picked up where he left off in Azerbaijan and stormed to his second pole position of the 2022 Formula 2 championship.

The Estonian narrowly missed out on pole in Baku last season to his team-mate and fellow Red Bull junior, Liam Lawson but it was Vips’ turn to beat Lawson to the top spot of Sunday’s grid, pipping him by a tenth a half.

After taking the first win his F2 career in Monaco’s Sprint Race, PREMA Racing’s Dennis Hauger made it an all Red Bull junior top three after setting a time just short of Lawson and Vips.

It was a windy afternoon session at the Baku City Circuit and DAMS‘ Ayumu Iwasa was caught out at Turn 4 which brought out a red flag. The Japanese driver was on provisional pole at the time of the incident and looked like he had some serious pace in his locker, but thirteenth was the best he could manage following his retirement.

Once the session got back underway, the times started to topple with Trident’s Richard Verschoor and Hauger clocking in some quick times.

The new Balance of Performance (BoP) changes have been handed out ahead of the 90th 24 Hours of Le Mans, favouring the struggling AF Corse Ferraris but seeing a reduction befall the #36 Alpine Elf Team Hypercar.

Ferrari, who have been struggling with pace since the start of the weekend, have been given back some power ahead of the race. The Am cars have been handed a 0.01 power boost relative to the RPM, whereas the Pro cars have been given 0.02. This means the Pros are down 0.04 from their Le Mans test BoP, the Ams down 0.06. No further reductions have been made, with all Ferraris retaining their reduced fuel per stint.

In Hypercars, the only car to see a BoP change is the Alpine. After being rewarded a power boost on Thursday, they’ve lost more than they gained, now with up to a 10kW deficit pending on the RPM. With the surprise 3m24s lap time from Nicolas Lapierre in Hyperpole, the team have been penalised for seeming to sandbag through the practice sessions.

How balanced the Hypercar, GTE Pros and GTE Ams are will remain to be seen come lights out tomorrow for the 24 Hours of Le Mans. The Automobile Club de l’Ouest remain able to change the BoP until lights out tomorrow, and although it’s not expected, there is still the possibility for more changes ahead of the race.

Rob MacCachren might have been in a celebratory mood in the six days since winning the 54th Baja 500, but a number of his fellow competitors were less than pleased with their placements in the official results by SCORE International. On Thursday, in the wake of multiple driver protests and appeals, SCORE released an amended finishing order that added or erased penalties, and awarded time credits that removed chunks from their finishing times. Much of these come in response to a bottleneck that greatly hindered the field’s races.

The bulk of the situation developed at the 102nd mile which lies a mountain point called the Summit, where Dan Myers‘ Trophy Truck co-driver suffered from heat exhaustion and required medical attention. After fellow competitors assisted the navigator, he was driven down the Summit and airlifted via helicopter to hospital. While Myers’ truck was stopped, John McNeil‘s Trophy Truck Spec went off course to go around it but got lodged on a rock, destroying the vehicle’s driveshaft and blocking the path. A support Ford Ranger owned by Ramon Torres helped drive the co-driver back to base before pulling McNeil’s truck out of its rut. The co-driver has since recovered, while Myers and McNeil would respectively finish seventeenth and twenty-first in their classes.

SCORE released the results on Sunday, initially regarded as official before being taken down and re-posted with slight adjustments to settle errors like a four-hour speeding penalty on Class 11 winner Alex Gonzales. However, the second edition was also met with uproar as drivers argued their ensnaring in the delays severely impacted their final times. Twenty-two entries received credits for sacrificing time to aid those like Myers’ team; Trophy Truck Spec drivers Christian Sourapas and Jordan Brenthel along with Trophy Trucker Gary Magness were awarded credits that nullified over an hour of lost time.

However, others argued they should have received credits as well and called out SCORE for the supposedly arbitrary manner of their allocations, especially as credits have the power to impact the order. Sourapas initially got just twelve minutes of credits despite being “one of the vehicles actually assisting in the medical emergency.”

In the Pro UTV Forced Induction class, Brandon Schueler got a twenty-five-minute credit to place second ahead of Branden Sims despite the latter physically finishing ahead of him without penalties. In a since-deleted Instagram post, Sims condemned the time credit by claiming SCORE “randomly pick and chose which vehicles received a ‘time credit’ for sitting in an emergency situation logjam where over 50+ vehicles were stuck not able to do anything except sit and wait. Some teams received a time credit for this and others did not, feels like I was penalized without doing anything wrong.” He also went as far as to threaten the 500 would be “my last race with @scoreinternational if they don’t fix this issue, I work too hard to be robbed of the position my team and I earned.” Fortunately for him, such an ultimatum was unnecessary as the new results restored his runner-up finish.

Sergio Pérez began the Azerbaijan Grand Prix the same way he ended the Monaco Grand Prix and last year’s race at the Baku City Circuit, on top. The Oracle Red Bull Racing driver topped the session after running on the Soft tyres, clocking a 1:45.476.

The usual protagonists were close behind, with Charles Leclerc in second +0.127s adrift of the Mexican with championship leader Max Verstappen in third +0.334s behind. The second Scuderia Ferrari of Carlos Sainz Jr rounded off the top four, who were well ahead of the rest. Half a second separated the top four, whereas Fernando Alonso in fifth was an entire second behind Pérez.

The BWT Alpine F1 Team have brought some “circuit-specific modifications” to Baku, which appear to be working well thus far. Lewis Hamilton was sixth after the opening session, however, the Brit was one of a number of drivers to experience from vicious porpoising down the 2.22km main straight. The sheer volume and aggressiveness of the porpoising was highly likely to have been as a result of the typically windy conditions in Baku, with many on the grid complaining of the conditions.

Yuki Tsunoda impressed in seventh-place, just ahead of George Russell, Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon who rounded-off the top ten. Lando Norris who finished the session in eleventh, was staggeringly +2.2s off the pace, with the entire field being seperated by over three seconds.

At the bottom of the timesheets sat Nicholas Latifi and Mick Schumacher, two drivers who are driving for their Formula 1 careers. It was the worst possible start to the weekend for both of them, Latifi’s car “just died” after seven laps of running and Schumacher had to park his VF22 before even setting a laptime. The young German suffered from a suspected water pressure issue.

Azerbaijan Grand Prix Free Practice 1 Full Results:

POS	DRIVER	NAT.	TEAM	TIME
1	Sergio Pérez	MEX	Oracle Red Bull Racing	1m45.476s
2	Charles Leclerc	MON	Scuderia Ferrari	1m45.603s
3	Max Verstappen	NED	Oracle Red Bull Racing	1m45.810s
4	Carlos Sainz Jr	ESP	Scuderia Ferrari	1m46.012s
5	Fernando Alonso	ESP	BWT Alpine F1 Team	1m46.517s
6	Lewis Hamilton	GBR	Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team	1m46.667s
7	Yuki Tsunoda	JPN	Scuderia AlphaTauri	1m46.696s
8	George Russell	GBR	Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team	1m46.705s
9	Pierre Gasly	FRA	Scuderia AlphaTauri	1m46.830s
10	Esteban Ocon	FRA	BWT Alpine F1 Team	1m46.917s
11	Lando Norris	GBR	McLaren F1 Team	1m47.691s
12	Lance Stroll	CAN	Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant Formula One Team	1m47.847s
13	Kevin Magnussen	DEN	Haas F1 Team	1m47.946s
14	Sebastian Vettel	GER	Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant Formula One Team	1m47.970s
15	Valtteri Bottas	FIN	Alfa Romeo F1 Team Orlen	1m48.078s
16	Guanyu Zhou	CHN	Alfa Romeo F1 Team Orlen	1m48.222s
17	Alexander Albon	THA	Williams Racing	1m48.419s
18	Daniel Ricciardo	AUS	McLaren F1 Team	1m48.810s
19	Nicholas Latifi	CAN	Williams Racing	1m50.921s
20	Mick Schumacher	GER	Haas F1 Team	1m58.332s