George Russell ended a barren run without a victory in Formula One at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix by just 0.196 seconds ahead of Max Verstappen, with championship leader Kimi Antonelli moving up from 16th to fifth, thanks in part to two safety cars following crashes.
Russell did everything a leader on a street circuit with a long straight should do: he got a good start, immediately broke through the one-second overtaking window and had extended his lead to 12 seconds by the time of the first pit stops.
His biggest initial concern was “nibbling” into the wall exiting Turn 15 on lap 25 of 51, but he otherwise ran smoothly until Alex Albon crashed at Turn 4 on Lap 31 erasing his advantage.
The safety car benefited Russell’s teammate Kimi Antonelli the most.
Championship leader Antonelli started 16th and actually lost a place at the start, then took 17 laps to pass seven cars and reach the money positions. Although his progression was not as rapid as his comeback victory at Monza from 19th, it was more cautious and more stable with probably the championship lead in mind.
He caught and passed Franco Colapinto after erasing a gap of just under four seconds for ninth place, then was handed eighth place when Lando Norris’s disappointing run continued as the McLaren driver continued straight ahead with a lock-up at Turn 1.
At the time of the safety car’s intervention, Antonelli was eighth, 35 seconds behind Russell, but the safety car brought the field together to give him a better chance of progressing and allowed him to switch to the preferred soft tyres.
He immediately regained his place on the restart when a huge melee broke out at turn 1.
A massive, almost comical block from Colapinto crushed him against Alpine teammate Pierre Gasly – who had finished seventh on the restart – and also took out Norris, while Liam Lawson was also spun in the concertina effect behind by Arvid Lindblad. “I love getting knocked out by my teammate,” Lawson said sarcastically, as Alpine lost a brace in the chaos – much to Gasly’s chagrin and Colapinto’s apologies.
In the most stressful scenario where Verstappen was behind, Russell absolutely nailed the restart on lap 39, but Verstappen remained in overtaking mode until three laps later, then Verstappen set the fastest lap of the race to close in – refusing to accept defeat.
Until two laps remaining, Verstappen stayed within range and put Russell under pressure, until Russell finally created a gap of 1.4 seconds, but Verstappen then closed in on the race to finish off the line on the final lap once the two left the scene of Valtteri Bottas’ crashed Cadillac.
But Russell just managed to hold on to his first victory since the Austrian GP at the end of June.
“After the double yellow I had no boost, no power,” Russell said after the race.
Verstappen charged through the field from his eighth starting spot in the opening stages, and despite some wrangling between him and his engineer over the mediums and initial intense pressure from Isack Hadjar, rode a strong race to take second. He had already overtaken Oscar Piastri for second place after the first safety car restart.
Hadjar had an incredible result to take third place after three races injured, and was clearly faster in the opening stages and played a great race with his teammate in offering to stay behind Verstappen.
Fourth-place finisher Charles Leclerc was passed by both Red Bulls and appeared to struggle to find pace, making a podium unlikely on the day. It could have been worse had Piastri not bowed out of the battle with a first-corner lock that sent him into the runoff zone, compounding McLaren’s disappointing day.
Antonelli suffered floor damage after being hit by Ollie Bearman on the first safety car restart, and initially struggled to clear Lewis Hamilton, but eventually overtook five laps after the second restart at Turn 1 and went no further, taking fifth place on another comeback.
Hamilton was the only driver in the top 10, other than Russell, to finish where he started, perhaps reflecting Ferrari’s struggles with race pace.
Behind him, the accident caused by Alpine created chaos and brought into play a multitude of cars far from the points.
In news, Esteban Ocon may have lost his Haas seat, but his teammate Bearman jumped between the two safety cars, but was then beaten on the final lap by just 0.030 seconds – with Lindblad stealing the place across the finish line. He avoided a penalty for Lawson’s incident and made some opportunistic overtakes to make the most of a difficult weekend with seventh place.
Ocon took eighth place ahead of Bearman, while the improved Williams scored a point thanks to Carlos Sainz, who was only 19th after his early stop.
Hülkenberg missed the point with 11th place, ahead of Lawson, Gabriel Bortoleto, Piastri and Sergio Perez.
Gn sports
