Before Baku appeared on the calendar, stages on city circuits sometimes proved boring – a lot was decided in qualifying and in races it was almost impossible to fight for position. There are many examples. Monaco, Singapore, urban Valencia with a swing bridge, Melbourne where four DRS zones had to be created. The route in Baku turned out to be completely different and became an example for the rest – then the equally treacherous and dangerous Jeddah appeared on the calendar.
Fast city track with a nice section in the old town and looks great, and the race gives unpredictable. Pretty much everyone there has made mistakes in the past six years. And also this time it will not go without mistakes. The circuit is often referred to as a combination of Monaco and Monza, but this is the case when the sum is more interesting than the terms. In Monaco, the most interesting qualifying is when the riders attack at the limit and risk an accident. In Monza the race is more interesting. Everything is interesting in Baku.
The first leg in Baku was called the European Grand Prix, we can say that the fourth leg opens the European part of the season, which will be interrupted next week by an away game in Miami, but will then continue until the beginning of September in Monza.
In the next 14 weeks we will see ten Grand Prix. Drivers, teams, everyone involved in Formula 1 will not be easy. On the one hand, football is also played every week, but for the enormous circus that Formula 1 carries with it, such a schedule is clearly unnecessary. When there were two weeks between stages under Bernie, the anticipation of the next race was sweet and intriguing, and now the fans are looking for a break between stages to rest.
Saturday’s sprint stage is a sort of quest to be solved before Sunday’s Grand Prix. The previous format was unsuccessful, the teams debated it for a long time and finally agreed, literally approving the rules this week. Let’s see how they work. We are waiting for two independent qualifiers and two independent races – Saturday’s 100km sprint and Sunday’s Grand Prix, which will not affect each other in any way except possible accidents.
The basic drawbacks of the previous format remained: the closed park regime between Friday qualifying and Sunday’s race, which was somewhat weakened, and the understandable reluctance of drivers to take risks on Saturday so as not to damage the cars before the start of the Grand Prix. , which is very likely in Baku.
And, as it was said in Melbourne, “you will never be asked how many sprints you have won. The question is always how many Grand Prix victories you have!”
Favorites remain the same. Due to a tight schedule and limited budgets, rivals cannot close the gap on Red Bull. It is no longer possible to build a new version of the chassis or work on several projects at the same time. Now it’s all about the budget. And if a team gets a serious advantage at the start of the season, it will have no problem using it.
In 2023, the situation is very similar to that of 2009, when Brawn GP embodied the idea of a Honda engineer by putting a double diffuser on the car. Honda engineers now work for Red Bull Racing.
Many are already thinking about the cars of 2024, realizing that this season they will not be able to seriously change the situation, and no matter how effective the new items are, the rivals are also not standing still.
But that doesn’t mean there won’t be attempts. Due to the peculiarities of the circuit in Baku, we will not see any major novelties, but they will appear in Imola and Barcelona, where the European part of the season will really start.
In the meantime, Baku!
Source: F1 News
I am Christopher Clyde, an experienced journalist and content writer with a passion for sports. I have been writing about Formula 1 news for the past five years and am currently employed as an author at athletistic.com, one of the top sports websites in the US.
