Max Verstappen remained upbeat for Red Bull’s prospects at the 2024 Azerbaijan GP weekend in Baku despite making a series of unforced errors at the Baku City Circuit through FP2 as he found himself half a second off the pace.
The world champion is seeking a big result to give himself a strong buffer over Lando Norris and Charles Leclerc as his team aims to solve their problems with a car plagued by poor balance and unpredictable inconsistency.
And whilst the Dutchman still made mistakes, he is upbeat as Red Bull found the pace to compete despite the 26-year-old hovering around half a second behind the benchmark time on Friday afternoon on September 13.
“I think overall it was a good day. We learned quite a bit,” Verstappen told F1 TV by the Caspian Sea. “Now it’s just about tying up the things that we tried, but I think so far we have been more competitive this weekend.
“So that’s a positive. There’s been a lot of work in the background, which also won’t stop, but today was positive.”
Verstappen explains constant mistakes
Sergio Perez found himself just 0.006 behind Leclerc’s Ferrari, whilst the Mexican also edged out Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes by 0.060 showing that Red Bull can challenge the frontrunners over one lap at least.
It offers a welcome potential return to form for the championship leads, who finished the Dutch GP 22.9 seconds behind McLaren‘s Norris and 37.9 seconds back in sixth at the Autodromo Nazionale Monza in their late season slump.
But in FP2 at the 2024 Azerbaijan GP, for Verstappen it wasn’t entirely smooth-sailing with a series of unforced errors including a near-miss as he almost crashed into the tyre barriers at Turn 5, just managing to slam on the brakes early enough to stop in time.
About as close as it gets! 😳#F1 #AzerbaijanGP pic.twitter.com/K3EqevB5qw
— Formula 1 (@F1) September 13, 2024
However, he waved away the mistakes by simply pointing to the track characteristics of the Baku City Circuit as the reason why he struggled for his trademark smooth consistency, one of the greatest weapons in his arsenal.
“It’s also the track,” Verstappen said in response to being asked about the errors. “It’s very slippery, with a lot of 90-degree corners.
“So if you have a tiny lock-up, sometimes you need to hold the brake to avoid hitting the wall or whatever, just out of precaution.
“For sure, FP2 was a bit more difficult for me. Like I said, we just need to get the balance together a bit more, and I’m quite confident that we can be competitive.”
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