Five talking points from a dramatic Azerbaijan GP

Verstappen’s blow-out leaves big questions

Pirelli will be feeling the heat this week in the wake of Max Verstappen’s dramatic exit from the lead and a race he’d dominated. His left-rear tyre failure pitched the Red Bull into the wall on the start/finish straight in what was the second lucky escape of the day, following Lance Stroll’s almost identical blowout earlier on. It’s far from the first time Pirelli tyre failures have compromised driver safety and heavily influenced results since its era of supplying the entire grid began in 2011. On this occasion, both drivers knew they could count themselves fortunate to escape injury in big impacts and avoid collisions with other cars in crashes that took place at speeds approaching 200mph.

Stroll’s puncture occurred after he’d run 30 laps from the start on a set of white-walled hard tyres, a strategy his Aston Martin team had plumped for because the Canadian’s qualifying crash at the infamous Turn 15 meant he started from the back. The ploy pushed him up the order to fourth and Stroll looked odds on for a decent points haul once he’d stopped for red-walled soft tyres – but he never got that far.

At face value, Verstappen’s failure on lap 46 – his 34^th on the hards – looked identical, although we must wait for Pirelli’s investigation for a definitive verdict. The tyre company pointed the finger at debris as a possible cause for both deflations, although Verstappen was sceptical. If that was the case, it was an unfortunate coincidence that such a problem should occur on the same wheel of both cars. But if a construction failure turned this race on its head, Pirelli will once again find itself negotiating stormy F1 waters.

Hamilton’s finger trouble

Verstappen’s dreadful misfortune, having passed Charles Leclerc’s pole position-winning Ferrari and undercut Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes-AMG to take a lead he never looked likely to lose, should have cost him the world championship lead he’d earned with victory last time out in Monaco. That it didn’t was all down to what Hamilton and Mercedes admitted was a moment of ‘finger trouble’ for the seven-time world champion.

The red flag for Verstappen’s crash left just two laps to be run from the standing restart. Hamilton had talked of a “marathon, not a sprint” on his way to the grid, in reference to the risks he wouldn’t take in trying to steal the win from Perez, who had inherited his team-mate’s lead. But Lewis being Lewis, he was always going to give everything to win, given the golden chance that had unexpectedly presented itself.

His brakes were smoking alarmingly on the grid, but he made the better getaway and had the inside line on the short run to Turn 1 – only to sail straight on with both fronts fully locked. Perez must have smiled as he took the turn and faced a clear track ahead. It turns out Hamilton had mistakenly switched on Merc’s ‘magic button’ that is used to switch the brake balance fully to the front tyres on warm-up laps, to generate heat into the rubber. Turns out he’s human after all.

Joy for ‘Checo’ in Red Bull breakthrough

It had already been a good day for Perez. The Mexican was a little unlucky to be starting only sixth, but quickly made up two places on Carlos Sainz Jr. and Gasly in the race’s opening moments, passed Leclerc at the start of lap eight, then like Verstappen jumped Hamilton at the pitstops in the wake of a slow tyre change for the Mercedes squad. ‘Checo’ was hired by Christian Horner and Helmut Marko to deliver staunch support to Verstappen and ensure Red Bull has two cars running at the front this year. Inevitably, Perez has taken some time to acclimatise to Red Bull – but here he was hitting his brief to perfection in Baku, and that meant he was perfectly placed to keep the team’s end up when Verstappen’s tyre let him down. The hugs with his team bosses and their delighted reaction to his victory could be just what he needs to fuel vital confidence that might fire him through the summer races – and perhaps ensure his tenure of the second Red Bull seat isn’t a one-season flash in the pan.

Vindication for Vettel

For much of his final years at Ferrari – and even at the start of his reboot at Aston Martin this year – Sebastian Vettel appeared to be a busted flush, a four-time world champion desperately clinging on despite being just 33 years old. But in the past couple of races green shoots have sprouted to suggest Vettel still has what it takes – and at Baku he proved all of us doubters wrong in true style.

On Saturday he’d been disappointed to just miss out on the final Q3 session, but a long first stint on Pirelli’s soft tyres from P11 on the grid pushed him up to a promising seventh. That became sixth when team-mate Stroll crashed out, and when the race turned green following a safety car interlude he passed under the Ferrari of old team-mate Leclerc at Turn 1. Sweet.

A lap later he shot past Gasly – “that’s not possible!” exclaimed the Frenchman – and briefly even appeared to be a threat to Hamilton’s third place. Verstappen’s dramatic departure put him in sight of a podium, and then Hamilton’s error at the restart gifted him second place. But there was still work to be done as he duelled with Gasly over those final two laps. That he came out on top was perhaps the clearest signal of all that the old Vettel is alive and well at Aston Martin as the British car maker claimed its historic first podium finish.

Midfield throws up winners and losers

Race day was downbeat for Leclerc whose Ferrari lost the edge it had in qualifying. Fourth was all he could take from Baku in the end. Lando Norris recovered well from his three-place grid penalty for a red flag violation in qualifying to claim fifth for McLaren, and that wily old fox Fernando Alonso came from nowhere to steal sixth at the restart for Alpine.

Yuki Tsunoda finished where he started in seventh to score good rookie points for AlphaTauri, but Sainz will be unhappy with eighth after out-braking himself at Turn 8, and Daniel Ricciardo remains off the pace in the other McLaren, finishing ninth. Kimi Räikkönen scored his first point of 2021 in 10^th, ahead of Alfa Romeo team-mate Antonio Giovinazzi.

And who was next? Valtteri Bottas. The Finn cuts an unfortunate figure right now because nothing is going his way in the second Mercedes after a desperate weekend in Baku. But look at Vettel’s renaissance: true talent can never be written off in F1 and he should take heart from that. As we said at the top, you just can’t take your eyes of this increasingly remarkable grand prix season.

Images courtesy of Motorsport Images.