#AzerbaijanGP FP2: @SChecoPerez heads @RedBullRacing one-two. #F1

Sergio Perez was quickest in the afternoon FP2 session at the Azerbaijan GP ahead of Red Bull team-mate Max Verstappen and Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz who completed the top three.

The Mercedes duo – headed by Lewis Hamilton in 11th place – finished the hour-long session down the order as the World Champion’s struggle on the first day of running at Baku continued.

FP2 was interupted by a red flag from Williams Racing’s Nicholas Latifi due to his FW43B racer suffering a loss of power towards the end of the first 15 minutes and by the virtual safety car, which was deployed when Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc lost the front wing off his Scuderia Ferrari SF21 entry as he hit the barriers during his qualifying simulation run.

In the early stages, most drivers were using the C4 yellow side-walled medium tyres, with Sainz setting the benchmark of a 1:44.072.

Alpine F1 Team’s Fernando Alonso, AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly and Leclerc all enjoyed brief moments at the top of the time-sheets as the best effort slowly lowered.

Sainz then reclaimed P1 with a 1:43.162, which occurred just before Latifi’s halt caused the session to be stopped for seven minutes.

The Canadian went down the escape road at turn 15 – the high-speed left, which leads the circuit down the hill towards the end of the final sector and main-straight – where several drivers, including McLaren’s Lando Norris had gone off into the run-off area during the early proceedings.

Latifi’s excursion was at slow-speed, but after the Williams driver had reversed back onto the track, then reported his power-unit died and his FW43B came to a stop, which meant it had to be craned away under the red flag conditions.

The stoppage meant all the cars emerged on circuit with Pirelli’s softest tyre available for the weekend, the red-marked C5’s, in the middle part of the session when it resumed just before the 20 minute margin.

A few moments later, after a careful installation lap on the softs, Sainz improved to a 1:42.243 – a full second faster.

Leclerc slotted into P2 behind his Ferrari team-mate and then on his next flyer posted the best first sector.

But the Monegasque-youngster could not complete his hot-lap after locking his front-right tyre at high-speed on the rundown to turn 15’s left hander and went straight into the barriers, with the front-left locking as he approached the wall.

Luckily for Leclerc, he was able to make his way back to the pits for a front wing change, but the incident disrupted the qualifying simulation runs for many drivers behind him – including Verstappen and Hamilton.

Hamilton’s best effort on the softs, saw the Briton up to ninth before he was demoted down to his final spot on the time-sheets, with the reigning World Champion reporting “I don’t know where all the time is” as Mercedes continued to struggle with warming up their tyres – the issue, which has hit the Silver Arrows drivers at various races so far in the 2021 campaign.

After Hamilton set his personal best – Perez completed his second flyer and found enough time to take top spot with a 1:42.115, which remained as the session’s best time.

Verstappen improved also as his stint on the softs continued, but wounded up 0.101 seconds adrift of his team-mate complaining he had “no grip” at the front of his Honda-powered RB16B racer – a development, which the Dutchman described as “night and day” difference with how the car was handling in the earlier FP1 session.

The Red Bull’s improvements saw the Ferrari’s drop to third and fourth, with Gasly – who almost had a similar incident to Leclerc at turn 15 but was able to run down the escape road after locking his front-right tyre approaching the corner – taking fifth place as Alpine F1 Team’s Fernando Alonso was sixth.

The teams switched to traditional long-run data gathering for the final 15, where both Leclerc and Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas complained of bad graining on their rear medium compounds.

Alfa Romeo Racing’s Antonio Giovinazzi finished seventh and in-front of Norris who was eighth, Alpine F1 Team’s Esteban Ocon who took ninth and AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda completing the top ten.

Mercedes’ Hamilton ended the afternoon outside the top ten in 11th place and 1.041 seconds adrift of Perez’s Azerbaijan GP FP2 benchmark and the reigning World Champion was ahead of Alfa Romeo Racing’s Kimi Raikkonen who took 12th and McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo 13th on the time-sheets.

Aston Martin pairing Lance Stroll and Sebastian Vettel finished FP2 in 14th and 15th respectively as Mercedes’ Bottas was a low 16th.

Williams Racing’s George Russell ended the day in 17th place and in-front of Haas F1 Team duo Nikita Mazepin and Mick Schumacher who were 18th and 19th respectively with aforementioned team-mate Latifi bringing up the rear.

You can see the full Formula 1 Azerbaijan Grand Prix 2021 Free Practice 2 Results Classification at the link: https://www.formula1.com/en/results.html/2021/races/1068/azerbaijan/practice-2.html

Missed out on FP1? Read about what happened here: #AzerbaijanGP FP1: @Max33Verstappen leads @ScuderiaFerrari pairing. #F1

#Formula1 #AzerbaijanGP 2021 Preview. #F1