Charles Leclerc, driving for Ferrari, gave Red Bull their toughest race yet in the Baku sprint of the Formula 1 2023 season. Despite suggestions from Red Bull’s Sergio Perez that he was not at his peak pace, Leclerc started the race from pole position, having qualified first in Friday qualifying for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.
Leclerc made a perfect start to the sprint and held on to the lead for several laps until Perez managed to catch up and overtake him on the eighth lap of the 17-lap mini race. Perez went on to win the race with a margin of four-and-a-half seconds over Leclerc. However, Leclerc managed to keep Red Bull’s Max Verstappen behind him, albeit with the caveat that Verstappen was carrying major sidepod damage after an earlier collision with George Russell of Mercedes.
In the three Grands Prix of the season so far, Red Bull has held a clear advantage over the rest of the pack in race trim. However, it seems that Ferrari has made major inroads into that buffer. Perez claimed that he felt there was more pace in the Red Bull RB19 during the Baku sprint, potentially distorting the true picture somewhat. Perez also believes that it is not only Red Bull who have more pace to unleash.
Speaking to reporters after the sprint, Perez said, “I think I had more pace than what I’ve shown today, but it’s difficult to know because if you use your 100% pace then probably the tyres become a problem, so I think I was just driving to the maximum capacity of the tyre basically. I think all cars are much better than this, but it’s all about looking after the tyres and making sure to arrive at the end.”
Tyre management in race trim has been a weakness for Ferrari, which has carried over from the 2022 season into this year. However, it was a positive sign for the team as Leclerc managed to avoid a scenario where the medium tyres he was running fell off the cliff.
While Leclerc reckons Ferrari has taken a step forward, he agreed with Perez that Red Bull were not at their absolute best in the sprint. He said, “I think we did a step forward for sure. It looks a little bit better, but we still need to find something, and that something feels quite significant still because the Red Bull, as Checo said, maybe he could have pushed a bit more, and we know that too. So yes, we need to find something more.”
