The Azerbaijan Grand Prix had a 2-2 record coming into today’s race. Twice we have seen utter drama and chaos, and twice we have endured borefests. The fifth edition did both in one go.
That’s probably an unfair reflection of how things looked early on, when pole-sitter Charles Leclerc slipped behind Lewis Hamilton but then stuck with the Mercedes, in turn allowing him to hold off Max Verstappen for a few laps. 0.8sec covered the top three and it looked like a fun day was in store.
Then Leclerc lost DRS compared to the very-fast-in-a-straight-line Mercedes, and both Verstappen and Sergio Perez – having made an excellent start to jump to fourth within three corners – quickly swept past.
