McLaren was back on the top step of the podium in Baku after the disappointment of losing to Ferrari in Monza. It was all down to Oscar Piastri’s brilliant move on Charles Leclerc early in the second stint that set him up for victory.
Although Leclerc tried everything he could to retake the lead of the race while hanging close behind Piastri, he could not pass the McLaren and eventually lost all his tire performance in the closing stages of the race. Former McLaren mechanic Marc Priestley has explained why Leclerc was not able to make the move.
“Getting past him so early was decisive because it meant he spent most of that Grand Prix in the lead of the race where it’s so less detrimental to your tires as opposed to Leclerc finding himself in second after that move and in the dirty air of the McLaren,” Priestley explained in a recent video on his YouTube channel.
“You will have seen with about three four, or five laps to go, the tires on Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari just disappeared off the performance cliff.”, he added.
Ferrari waited for a lap to switch to the hard tires compared to McLaren as they had a comfortable lead of close to seven seconds. However, when the Monegasque came out of the pits after his stop, Piastri was right on his gearbox and made a daring pass by lunging down the inside into turn one on lap 20 to take the lead.
Oscar Piastri making a move on Charles Leclerc for the race lead in Azerbaijan pic.twitter.com/hpux9RsEQV
— did oscar score points in f1 today? (@oscarpiastri81) September 15, 2024
Leclerc then had to deal with the dirty air of the McLaren through the second stint which hurt his tires more despite the extremely good tire degradation on the Ferrari.
Despite getting close several times, Leclerc never made a lunge similar to the Aussie driver. After the race, the Monegasque conceded that Piastri drove a better race than him and his failure to defend his line on lap 20 cost him the victory.
