Max Verstappen had a largely untroubled run to victory in Azerbaijan – until he encountered the two Alpine drivers battling over the last two positions.
Pierre Gasly took advantage of the Red Bull driver appearing in his mirrors to overtake his team mate ahead of him. He relegated Franco Colapinto in the other Alpine to 19th and last with his pass on lap 48.
However it came at a cost to Verstappen, who complained about his delay behind the two backmarkers. “I lost so much time with that,” he told race engineer Gianpiero Lambiase.
Colapinto entered the final laps ahead of Gasly despite being significantly delayed when he was knocked into a spin by Alexander Albon on lap 17. Gasly lost time after running a long opening stint on hard tyres and being passed by Gabriel Bortoleto and Alexander Albon.
When Gasly made his pit stop on lap 36 he emerged from the pits three seconds behind his team mate and quickly caught him. But despite having medium compound tyres which were 19 laps fresher than Colapinto’s hards, he was unable to find a way past his team mate.
Gasly spent 10 laps within DRS range of Colapinto as he tried to find a way past. He was irked by his team mate’s defensive moves at times, claiming “he moved under braking” at one point.
Verstappen caught the Alpine drivers at around three seconds per lap. Alpine kept Gasly informed of how close the leader was. “When we get a blue flag let him through cleanly, please, he is the race leader,” Gasly’s race engineer Josh Peckett advised him. “No one challenging behind.”
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F1’s regulations state backmarkers “must allow the following driver to overtake at the first available
opportunity” once they are shown the blue flag, which happens when a following car gets within 1.2 seconds of them. Peckett told Gasly “blue flag, Verstappen” at turn seven.
Gasly was approaching the narrow turn eight at the time and didn’t let Verstappen pass on the straight approaching it. Now right on Colapinto’s tail, he waited until they accelerated out of turn 12 to let Verstappen by.
Ahead of them, Colapinto’s race engineer Stuart Barlow kept him informed about the situation in his mirrors. “Pierre has a solid blue for Verstappen, he’s going to now be the car behind, he is the race leader,” he said, followed immediately by the instruction to let Verstappen through: “Okay solid blue, Verstappen, let’s be sensible with this one here, let’s try and pick up DRS.”
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Colapinto reacted instantly when told to let Verstappen by, pulling over at turn 15. The two Alpines followed Verstappen down to the long acceleration zone towards turn one and although Colapinto was able to pick up DRS from the Red Bull, Gasly had drawn close enough to pounce, and dived down the inside of his team mate at turn one.
The two Alpines were the only cars Verstappen had to lap all race. But the delay cost him 1.3 seconds, as he reported to his race engineer Gianpiero Lambiase:
| Lap: 47/51 VER: 1’43.579 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Lambiase | Okay, four laps remaining, Max. Four laps. Just caution. You are approaching Gasly and Colapinto, they are racing. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Lap: 48/51 VER: 1’43.942 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Lambiase | Definitely picking up that dirty air now. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Lambiase | So three laps remaining. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Lap: 49/51 VER: 1’45.535 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Verstappen | Verstappen overtakes the Alpines between turns 12 and 15 I lost so much time with that. |
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| Lambiase | Yeah, just hiding behind, Colapinto may decide to use the DRS. Yeah, so Colapinto will be on DRS, so just eyes behind, you’ve got two cars approaching you very quickly. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Lap: 50/51 VER: 1’43.388 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Lambiase | Two laps remaining Max, track is clear ahead. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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