As the pink lights flashed, nineteen F1 automobiles hurtled in direction of the primary nook of Azerbaijan Grand Prix, besides the game’s championship chief Oscar Piastri was lifeless final.
The Australian jumped the beginning which triggered the anti-stall on his McLaren, dropping the 24 year-old from ninth place to final place in seconds. Piastri tried to get well however locked up seconds later and crashed into the boundaries close to flip 5, ending his race on the opening lap.
Oscar Piastri watches the race after crashing in Baku. Credit: Getty Images
The uncharacteristic error from the sometimes unflappable Australian cements a nightmarish week of unforced errors, together with the same shunt in qualifying.
However, Piastri’s teammate and rival Lando Norris was unable to capitalise on the Australian’s mistake, ending in seventh place and lowering the championship hole to 25-points. While it’s been a grim day for the Aussie driver, the injury to his lead may have been a lot worse.
“Certainly, not my most interesting second,” Piastri stated in a post-race interview.
“Just anticipated the beginning an excessive amount of… foolish, easy error actually with that… the crash, simply didn’t anticipate the soiled air in the way in which I ought to’ve.”
“I believe the grip stage was low… however I ought to know that, so actually not blaming it on something apart from myself,” he continued. “I didn’t make the judgment calls that I wanted to on the proper instances.”
The Australian stated he was solely centered on bettering and searching ahead.
Meanwhile, Red Bull championship Max Verstappen clinically transformed pole place to win the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, with George Russell in second and a dream podium for third-placed Carlos Sainz and the underdog Williams crew.
Baku’s avenue circuit – characterised by his high-speed corners and 90-degree turns – is extremely twisty and slender and subsequently the proper recipe for chaos and calamity. This was evident throughout Saturday’s rain-soaked qualifying session which was marred by a number of crashes and a document six pink flags.
However, Sunday’s race was comparatively incident free, excluding a quick collision between Alex Albon and Franco Colapinto. Piastri’s crash briefly triggered a yellow flag, however the reigning four-time world champion was in a position to keep a wholesome lead, whereas the center of grid squabbled for locations.
Kiwi Liam Lawson defended third place for almost all of the race however was finally overtaken by rookie Kimi Antonelli, who drove beautifully after a difficult few races.
It was a fairytale end for Williams who’re one of the vital adorned groups in F1 historical past, however have sadly discovered themselves slipping behind over the previous twenty years. The crew’s final podium was in 2021 on the drenched Belgian Grand Prix when Russell completed second.
Now the drought is over with a podium and a Driver of the Day win for Carlos Sainz – his first podium since transferring from Ferrerai to Williams. The Spaniard was ecstatic over the radio, declaring that this was “the very best podium in my profession”.
The subsequent race shall be in Singapore on Sunday October 5.
