The F1 circus returned to the Caspian Sea last weekend for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix in Baku, and Round 4 of the 2023 World Championship.

As previously mentioned, Azerbaijan is my favourite race of the year: many crashes, a main straight long enough to rival the M56, and a trip through the old town where the track is just 7 metres wide.

After a four-week hiatus, I was hoping that F1 would come back with a bang, but Baku unfortunately failed to live up to the expectations set by itself in previous years. Anyhow, lets dive into the shallow end and review an uneventful race.

Azerbaijan was the first race to use F1’s Sprint format this season, which included 1 practice session and main race qualifying on the Friday, sprint qualifying and the sprint race on the Saturday, and the main race on the Sunday.

Max Verstappen’s Red Bull topped the practice session by 3 hundredths to Charles Leclerc in second, potentially suggesting Ferrari might’ve pulled their finger out, but many Ferrari fans (including myself) refused to get their hopes up. But when Leclerc went on to take pole position not only for the main race, but for the sprint race as well, believe me when I say jaws were on the floor and eyebrows were through the roof.

Charles would be joined on the front row for the sprint race by Sergio Perez in the other Red Bull, with Verstappen, George Russell’s Mercedes, and Leclerc’s teammate Carlos Sainz behind them.

In the sprint race, Russell and Verstappen would make contact at turn 2 of lap 1, with George understeering into the Red Bull on his way past into 3rd, consequently giving Max floor damage. Verstappen would later refer to Russell as “Princess George”, which I found very amusing.

Later that lap, Yuki Tsunoda would turn in too early at one of the kinks on the back straight and damage his rear right suspension, leading his tyre to fall off and roll down the track. Leclerc would try his hardest, but he succumbed to Perez’s wrath on lap 7, using the slipstream to dive past into turn 1 into the lead, and eventually win with ease. Leclerc followed in P2 for his first podium of the season, with a peeved Verstappen in third.

Leclerc would have another bite of the cherry on Sunday as he’d start from pole position again, only this time joined by Verstappen on the front row and Perez in third, with Sainz and Lewis Hamilton completing the top 5.

When the lights went out, Verstappen got a great start but had to settle behind Leclerc through turn 1, and the top 5 stayed as they were. That bite of the cherry would only be a nibble for Leclerc however, as by lap 3 he’d been passed by Verstappen for the lead at turn 1, and by lap 5 Perez would make the same move for 2nd.

On lap 9 Hamilton became the first driver to pit along with Lando Norris in the McLaren. Verstappen would pit the following lap from the lead, but this would prove costly however, as Nyck De Vries had crashed at turn 5 and 6. He’d nicked the wall on the inside and damaged his front-left suspension, which sent his car straight on to almost kiss the tyre barrier.

This brought out the safety car, allowing the drivers who hadn’t already pitted to do so (apart from Ocon, this is important for later), dropping Verstappen to 3rd and promoting Perez and Leclerc to P1 and 2.

The race resumed on lap 13, and Leclerc held off Verstappen through turn 1 and 2, but Max got a better exit out of turn 2 and easily passed the Ferrari into turn 3. Behind them, a readjusting Leclerc held up his teammate Sainz, which formed enough of a gap for Fernando Alonso to dive down the inside into turn 4, a phenomenal move by the Aston Martin driver who put himself into 4th.

Lap 19 and the other Aston Martin of Lance Stroll was doing well holding off Hamilton for 6th, before a massive slide at turn 16 gave the Mercedes the momentum he needed to sweep past before turn 1.

After I made a brew, watched an episode of 24 and grew a mullet, on lap 45 the first overtake in the top 10 for 26 laps occurred when a lockup for Nico Hulkenberg’s Haas at turn 6 invited Lando Norris to recover from that pitstop blunder earlier in the race and get past for 10th.

Esteban Ocon had waited until the final lap to make his pitstop, having gone 50 laps on a set of hard tyres. He came into the pits and, to a scene similar to an old TV bowling cutscene, was met by a flock of photographers in the middle of the pitlane waiting to get a snap of Sergio Perez crossing the line to win.

Esteban and the photographers did their best to avoid each other, and it was by some miracle that nobody was hurt. These wild photographers really need to be put on a leash I swear.

Either way, this didn’t manage to overshadow Sergio Perez, who crossed the line to comfortably win a disappointing Azerbaijan Grand Prix ahead of his teammate Max Verstappen. Charles Leclerc came third, beating Alonso to the podium. Sainz kept 5th ahead of Hamilton, Stroll, Russell, Norris and Yuki Tsunoda in the Alpha Tauri grabbed the final point in 10th.

This weekend closes the gap at the top to just 6 points with Perez’ triumphs in the sprint.

Predictions time, and I got another right! Sergio Perez and his street circuits are carrying me in these predictions I can’t lie, either way if I carry on, I might open up a stall on Blackpool seafront… but anyways.

Next race is this Coronation weekend in the US of A for the Miami Grand Prix, hoping to bounce back after its lacklustre debut last year.

My predictions for Miami are: Perez P1, Verstappen P2, Alonso P3. Fingers crossed Sergio has a bit of momentum underneath him.

That’s all from me, F1 isn’t usually this boring I promise! I hope Miami will turn it around. I’ll see you all next week.

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