You thought the late lunge was coming from Charles Leclerc.
But it surely by no means got here.
Because the laps ticked down within the System 1 Azerbaijan Grand Prix, the battle on the entrance was maybe the best of the season. A surprising lunge from Oscar Piastri at the beginning of Lap 20 noticed the McLaren driver seize the lead from Leclerc, who regarded as if he had one hand on the largest trophy following an incredible opening stint on a set of mediums. However with a set of hards bolted on Piastri’s MCL38, the automobile got here alive within the Australian driver’s fingers, permitting for one more beautiful overtake from Piastri in a season full of them.
However as these essential laps ticked down, Leclerc reeled Piastri in. There have been a number of laps the place, on the finish of one of many season’s longest straights Leclerc sniffed an overtake of Piastri, however he was not in a position to end the transfer because the Australian driver acquired his elbows out and defended each meter he wanted on the monitor.
Nevertheless, these laps of reeling Piastri in lastly took their toll. On Lap 48 of 51, Leclerc informed his crew that his rear tires had been gone. Piastri pulled away, and instantly the Ferrari driver was compelled to defend from a charging “King of the Streets,” as Sergio Pérez was proper on his rear wing in a combat for second.
That combat resulted in catastrophe. On Lap 50 Pérez and Carlos Sainz Jr. got here collectively, crashing into one another and bringing out the digital security automobile. Pérez had gotten by Leclerc for a second, opening the door for Sainz to get into third. However as Pérez rejoined that combat for third with Sainz, the 2 “drifted into one another” as described by Jolyon Palmer on F1TV, ending the race for each of them.
“What occurred there? What occurred?” requested Sainz after the collision.
Behind these drivers, one other essential battle performed out. After a catastrophic Saturday Lando Norris started the day outdoors of the factors, however a protracted stint on the exhausting tires to start the day noticed Norris pull into the factors. As these laps ticked down he was reeling in Max Verstappen, his rival within the Drivers’ Championship. A lead of over ten seconds for Verstappen for P6, forward of Norris in P7, ticked down into the only digits because the laps peeled away.
By Lap 47, Norris was inside three seconds of Verstappen.
By Lap 49, he was forward of him, passing Verstappen for P6 within the race, and taking away two extra factors from the Purple Bull driver.
The crash on Lap 50 introduced out the digital security automobile, and the race ended below these circumstances, delivering a large number of surprises. A win for Piastri, a second-place end for Leclerc, a shock beautiful fourth-place end for Norris — after beginning in fifteenth — and one thing now we have not seen since 2014:
McLaren atop the Constructors’ Championship standings.
Between Piastri’s victory and Norris’ beautiful restoration drive — ending fourth and choosing up a bonus level for the quickest lap of the race — McLaren now sits within the championship lead by 20 factors over Purple Bull.
“I felt like we had a little bit of little additional grip and I needed to go for it as a result of I knew that if I didn’t get previous at the beginning of the stint I used to be by no means going to get previous. Went for a reasonably large lunge however managed to tug it off, and held on for expensive life for the following 35 laps,” described Piastri to Guenther Steiner. “Was one of many higher races of my profession.”
The Australian driver then outlined what taking the lead within the championship means to him, and the crew.
“Contemplating the place we began after I joined the crew final 12 months, we had been actually final, and now we’re main the world championship. It’s a full credit score to the crew for the turnaround we’ve managed to have,” described Piastri. “It’s an enormous crew effort, and excited to see what the longer term holds.”
That future holds a surprising three-way combat for the Constructors’ Championship. With the grid heading to Singapore for subsequent weekend’s Singapore Grand Prix, McLaren leads Purple Bull 476-456 within the Constructors’ Championship, with Ferrari simply behind them with 425 factors on the 12 months.
However after weeks full of McLaren dealing with questions on whether or not they might really get issues proper in that combat, and questions on crew orders, they put collectively the Sunday they wanted to go away Baku behind because the leaders within the championship. Sure, Piastri’s win was an enormous issue, however don’t low cost what Norris was in a position to do on his facet of the storage. Not simply stepping into the factors, however throughout an important portion of the race, when Piastri was about to make his first pit cease, Norris was instructed to carry Pérez again a bit, to offer Piastri and the crew extra of a niche between him and Pérez when he rejoined the race after his cease.
Norris executed that to perfection, permitting Piastri to rejoin the race forward of the Purple Bull driver. Fairly than battling Pérez for second, Piastri was ready to chase down Leclerc for first.
Which he did in the long run.
We have no idea if McLaren will maintain onto that lead within the Constructors’ Championship, and in a season with so many twists and turns, extra definitely appear on the horizon.
But when they do go on to safe a championship, this can be the day they have a look at the place it really got here collectively.
