Red flagged day hails over Azerbaijan GP as Leclerc takes pole position
Sebastian Vettel missed out on Q3 by 0.029s as Mclaren driver Daniel Ricciardo crashed into the barriers at Turn 3 at the Azerbaijan GP.
Vettel was visibly furious as he missed out on a very slender margin which would have taken him into Q3.
Twitter world reacted to his unfortunate state:
On a tricky day in Baku, Charles Leclerc won his second consecutive pole of the season to put him in a commanding position for the race.
Lewis Hamilton starts in second position, while Red Bulls rival Max Verstappen landed in P3. The other drivers of the top two teams – Valterri Bottas and Sergio Perez finished in P10 and P7.
Vettel finished in a superb P5 at the last GP of the F1 season at Monaco. He was looking to replicate his performance, but a slight misfortune caused him to being P11. His teammate, Lance Stroll wasn’t far off as he crashed at the start of qualifying and now begins at P12.
Vettel, yesterday wasn’t comfortable with the conditions in Free Practice. “I just need to get into a better rhythm earlier in the session. It’s a tricky track, you need to have, one, the confidence, and second, unleash yourself. I struggled a bit with that,” he said.
Vettel had a disappointing start at Bahrain. He did not qualify for Q2 in his debut race finishing in a dismal 18th. He has since had massive improvement with Lance Stroll also improving over the season. Vettel then finished in 13th in Barcelona.
Vettel’s best performance this season came at Monaco, where he managed to finish P5 after qualifying in 8th. The German will be looking to get back to his impressive performances at Ferrari and Red Bull. The 4-time champion is past his prime, but definitely has a lot of fuel in the tank.
After joining from Ferrari last year, he was expected to come up with the goods replacing Sergio Perez, who moved to Red Bull. Hence, Vettel has a few seasons left in him and he’ll be looking to bow out on a high from the F1 fraternity.
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