Max Verstappen brushed off second place as “unlucky” after teammate Sergio Perez won the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.
The Red Bull pair made light work of overhauling Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari once the DRS was enabled to run one-two in the opening laps of Sunday’s race.
However, Nyck De Vries’ stricken AlphaTauri at Turn 6 triggered a Safety Car just after Verstappen had completed his first pit-stop, allowing Perez to box and continue ahead due to the reduced time lost.
But after the frustration following the Sprint on Saturday, the reigning champion took second place in his stride.
“I think with the Safety Car I was a bit unlucky,” he conceded.
LAP 12/51
The Safety Car is still on track, and it’s Perez who is tucked in behind it. Leclerc is further up the road with Verstappen in third ?#AzerbaijanGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/1mgHJ1ppBH
— Formula 1 (@F1) April 30, 2023
“I had to push a bit to stay close to try and get into the DRS but then the tyres started to overheat. I struggled also with the balance which wasn’t consistent and I was fiddling around with the tools.
“Once I got that right then the last 10 laps the car felt quite good again. It was a little too late, but a lot was learnt throughout the race. And, it’s a good result for the team.”
As for Perez, once in front, he produced another brilliant performance to not even offer Verstappen a sniff of victory.
“It really worked out for us today,” said the Mexican. “We managed to stay in the DRS train and keep the pressure on Max.
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“I think we had better [tyre] deg[radation] on that first stint. It was looking good from that side and then the Safety Car came and bunched everyone up.
“It was a race again on the hard tyres. I think it was very close between us, we pushed to the maximum today,” Perez added.
“We both touched the wall a few times, and the way Max pushed me was really hard but we managed to keep him under control.”
As Perez noted, both he and Verstappen had a few close calls with the concrete, with Checo feeling particularly lucky to escape a “really hard” hit approaching Turn 15 during the race.
The only barrier to Perez’s victory was… a barrier ?#AzerbaijanGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/NYRH9LOALV
— Formula 1 (@F1) April 30, 2023
“But,” Verstappen acknowledged, “that’s always part of racing at a street circuit.”