F1: Perez outduels Leclerc to win Azerbaijan Sprint Race

–by Mark Cipolloni–

Red Bull’s Sergio Perez used DRS to pass polesitter Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari on lap 8 and held on to win the first F1 Sprint race in Azerbaijan.

Once in front, Leclerc had nothing for Perez, despite having DRS for a few laps as the Red Bull pulled away to a 4.463s victory.

“I will get them tomorrow again,” said Perez on his cool-down lap.

“It was good! A lot of pressure on us, our teams, mechanics, drivers, so to get away with maximum points was the objective, but we know tomorrow is the main race,” said Perez.

“It confirms a little what we thought, the Red Bull still has the upper hand in the race, but we did a step forward,” said Leclerc.

“We are still not where we want to be, but we just need to take the maximum [we can]. I didn’t fight too much with [Perez] as I wanted to protect my tires, but we were still losing at the end with the degradation.”

Max Verstappen’s car was damaged by George Russell on the opening lap, and he could not keep up with the two lead cars, but the Dutchman hung about 1-second behind the Ferrari to finish 3rd.

“Well done Max, with an injured car that was good, well done,” Red Bull boss Christian Horner radioed to Verstappen

Verstappen wasted no time in having a word with Russell as soon as he got out of the car, in no uncertain terms asking his rival what he was thinking. Russell was pretty chill all things considered, shrugged as he said he understeered with cold tires, an answer that didn’t appease Verstappen, who pointed out everyone had cold tires.

“I just don’t understand why you need to take so much risk into Lap 1, understeering into my car,” said a miffed Verstappen.

“It is what it is. There’s a hole in my sidepod, it doesn’t look great and I lost performance.”

The Mercedes of George Russell finished 4th while the Ferrari of Carlos Sainz Jr.  rounded out the top-5.

Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton were a distant 6th and 7th.

The race had one safety car period when Yuki Tsunoda slapped the wall in his Alpha Tauri.

Sprint Race Results