Round seventeen of this year’s Formula One (F1) season took place Sunday in Baku, Azerbaijan at the Baku City Circuit. After 51 laps, McLaren driver Oscar Piastri took home his second F1 victory. Piastri earned 25 championship points and currently sits P4 in the Drivers Standings at a total of 222 points, only 13 points behind Charles Leclerc from Ferrari in P3.
Piastri was joined on the podium by Leclerc, who had qualified on pole position and George Russell from Mercedes. Russell claimed his spot at the last moment after a collision occurred on lap 50 between Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz and Red Bull Racing driver Sergio Perez.
Piastri took the lead on lap 20 after both he and Leclerc had pitted for a new set of tires. Piastri managed to hold off Leclerc for the rest of the race but constantly battled and struggled to close the gap between him and Leclerc.
“I knew that if I didn’t get past at the start of the stint, I was never going to get past,” Piastri said after the race. “I went for a pretty big lunge but managed to pull it off and then hang on for dear life for the next 35 laps.”
“I thought that when Oscar overtook me it was just a matter of staying calm, trying to keep those tires and overtake him later on, but actually it was a lot more difficult than that,” Leclerc said. “We lost the race when I didn’t quite defend as well as I should have at the end of the straight, but it’s the way it is. Sometimes you do mistakes and I’ll learn from it.”
Piastri’s teammate, Lando Norris, who is currently P2 in the Drivers Standings, attempted to challenge for the championship and finished P4 after starting the race from P15. The standings’ leader and defending champion Max Verstappen from Red Bull Racing finished the race P5 behind Norris.
Alongside McLaren’s share of points, Red Bull Racing’s low points finish allowed the team to take the lead in the Constructors Championship for the first time since the 2014 season. This put an end to a 55-race-long streak of Red Bull domination.
“Results like this definitely weren’t possible 12 months ago for myself,” Piastri, who is only in his second year in F1, said. “It’s a massive team effort and I’m excited to see what the future holds.”
Round eighteen of the 2024 F1 season will take place at 7 a.m. Sunday at the Marina Bay Street Circuit in Singapore.
