Charles Leclerc thought he had the best time in the last free practice session, but 7 minutes into the session Sergio Pérez took his place at the top of the classification, with a lap of 1 minute 43 seconds 170/1000.
The Mexican driver, the Monaco winner, has really found his rhythm in the Red Bull RB18 and, with a new contract in his pocket (for two years), is driving with great confidence.
Perez beat the Ferrari driver by 70 milliseconds and his Dutch teammate by 279 milliseconds.
The qualifying session is expected to be exciting, especially as the three drivers made mistakes on their last lap on this narrow and sometimes difficult track in Baku’s Old City.
Lance Stroll (Aston Martin) took 13th place, 1.709 seconds from the reference time, behind Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes-Benz), and fell out of the top ten, 1.675 seconds behind Perez.
The Briton ceded two millenniums to his teammate George Russell.
Toronto’s Nicholas Latifi (Williams) finished 20th and last, 2.9 seconds short of the fastest time.
The session started 15 minutes late, because the bulkhead had to be fixed. This means that the qualifying session will begin at 10:15 AM (EST).
It is the pleasure of motorsport enthusiasts who will be able to catch the start of the famous 24 Hours of Le Mans endurance event, scheduled for 10 am.
More details to come.
