FIA post-race press conference – Azerbaijan

1. Oscar Piastri (McLaren), 2. Charles Leclerc (Ferrari), 3. George Russell (Mercedes)

TRACK INTERVIEWS
(Conducted by Guenther Steiner)

Q: George, congratulations. Fantastic job. How surprised are you to be here on the podium today?

George RUSSELL: Yeah, definitely surprised. Glad to see Carlos and Checo are OK, but I think there was so much hard work this weekend for everybody in the team. There was engine changes on my side, engine changes for Lewis, so much going on. Everybody was working so hard. And we had a really bad start to the race. I was dropping off a lot. But on the Hard tyre, I think we were one of the quickest out there. And that was great. Got past Max. So an added bonus to stand on the podium.

Q: What was the most difficult moment for you in the race? Because as you said, you felt...

GR: Driving full gas into a wall of carbon fibre on the penultimate lap. I mean, that was pretty crazy. The sun was coming down. You couldn't see anything. I was shocked the Safety Car or VSC didn't come out sooner. You know, the car could have been anywhere. So, as I said, glad to see everybody was OK. It was a long old race and glad to be on the podium.

Q: Absolutely. Glad for the whole team that you get on the podium. And I think we now have got four manufacturers which can go for the podium. Do you think you can keep in there for the next races?

GR: I mean, we've got to be realistic still. We should have finished fifth today. That was the true result. Obviously, with Lando's qualifying yesterday, he probably would have been up there as well. So I don't want to get carried away with ourselves with this podium today. We've got a lot of work to do. Hopefully, Singapore is a slightly better weekend.

Q: Thanks a lot, George, and all the best. Enjoy it. Charles, congratulations. Again a podium. A very tough race for you, obviously, but it's a second place. So when did you realise that you really cannot get him?

Charles LECLERC: I think as soon as we put the Hard tyres. On the medium, we were very competitive and the car felt good. Unfortunately, we didn't do any high-fuel running on my side in FP1, FP2, and we went for a setup direction that maybe in the race was a bit more difficult to manage. Especially on the hard tyres. I was really struggling to just keep those rear tyres, and towards the end, I really thought that, yeah, in one corner or two, I thought that I would put it in the wall. It was very close. But second, today, McLaren and Oscar have done an exceptional job and have been better than us. It's obviously a huge shame for Carlos in the last lap, but hopefully everybody is OK. But, yeah, not obviously another great day for the team.

Q: Yeah, but you had a big fight, and you were fighting hard out there. How enjoyable was that, you know, to be there, for it to be possible to win? Obviously, you didn't in the end, but how enjoyable is that?

CL: It is enjoyable because you've got many opportunities every laps. I think maybe McLaren had a little bit less downforce. In the straights, they were very quick. In the corners, we were a bit quicker. But at the end, I thought that when Oscar overtook me, I was like, ‘OK, now it's just a matter of staying calm, trying to keep those tyres and overtake him again later on’. But actually, it was a lot more difficult than that. In the straights, I couldn't get as close as I wanted. And yeah, and eventually, to be honest, we lost the race where I didn't quite defend as well as I should have at the end of the straight. But it's the way it is. Sometimes you do mistakes and I'll learn from it.

Q: It was still a perfect job, Charles. Congratulations. And on to the next one. Thank you. Congratulations, Oscar. Fantastic race. I always have to think that it's only your second season. Very mature race. Tell me a little bit more about it. How did you overtake Charles? How did you control the race? You did it all yourself. There was no luck involved. You did a fantastic job. Explain it to us, please.

Oscar PIASTRI: Yeah, I mean, I tried at the start of the race to get in front, but once I dropped out of DRS, I just didn't have the pace, and after the stop, I saw we were pretty close again, and I felt like we had a little bit of extra grip, and I had to go for it because I knew that if I didn't get past, I was, didn't get past the start of the stint, I was never going to get past, so I went for a pretty big lunge, but managed to pull it off, and then hung on for dear life for the next 35 laps. So yeah, the last couple of laps, once he dropped out of DRS, were a little bit more relaxing, but there's no such thing as a relaxing lap around here. So it was hard work, but no, I think that definitely goes down as one of my better races of my career.

Q: It was a very good race, Oscar. And how does it feel to bring McLaren back in the lead of a world championship? It must be a great feeling being part of such a team, you know, long time not in this position. How do you feel? You're very young. And for you, tell us the feeling?

OP: Yeah, I think considering where we started when I joined the team last year, you know, we were literally last. And now we are leading the World Championship. So it's a full credit to the team for the turnaround we've managed to have in my 18 months here. Firstly, in terms of improving the car, but helping me improve as well. You know, results like this definitely weren't possible 12 months ago for myself. So it's a massive team effort. And yeah, excited to see what the future holds.

PRESS CONFERENCE

Q: Charles, if we come to you first, very well done. You drove beautifully. You spent a lot of time looking at the gearbox of Oscar Piastri's McLaren. What were the differences between your cars today?

CL: Thanks for reminding me! It's been a pretty frustrating race. We ran two different configurations. Obviously, they had, I think, a lower downforce package. We had a bit more downforce, which made us quite quick in the castle section. However, in all the straights they were flying. And that's probably where I lost the race. I misjudged that. And when Oscar overtook me into Turn 1, I was not too worried. I just wanted to stay within the DRS, keep my tyres, and attempt an overtake later on. However, this opportunity never really arose again, just because we were too slow in the straights. Yeah, that was a small misjudgement, which had a big consequence. So sometimes it hurts, and it does today. But it's the way it is. On the other hand, it's been a pretty good last couple of races in terms of performance. This weekend hasn’t been great, because obviously we've got Carlos that was in a good position that didn’t manage to finish the race. But within the team, we are in a good position in a good mood and we need to keep pushing in that direction.

Q: Thirty-one laps on the hard tyre was a lot, especially in dirty air the whole time, or pretty much the whole time. At what point did you start to struggle?

CL: Straight away. Straight away. As soon as I got out of the box on the Hard, we just didn't manage to find the grip that McLaren had on those tyres. And then again, when Oscar overtook me, I was quite calm in the car. And I just was focusing on my tyre management, which I did. And after 10, 15 laps, I thought that everything was coming together and that maybe towards the end, we will be in a better place. But with the dirty air, I think for 20, 25 laps towards the end, my tyres were completely gone. And again, they were just too quick in the straights for me to attempt anything.

Q: Can you talk us through Oscar's move for the lead? Did he catch you by surprise?

CL: Not really by surprise, because he wasn't completely straight behind me. He was a little bit on the left. So I could see in my mirrors that he was there and that it was a possibility for him to go there. But again, I couldn't really be super aggressive. I still had cold tyres. I was really struggling to put those tyres into temperature. I just thought it wasn't that much of a big deal if he would overtake me at that point of the race because the race was still long and the DRS would help me to stay within a second of him and then once my tyres will be in temperature I could overtake him again. But as I said, that was a misjudgement from my side.

Q: Now, you said there's a good mood in the team. This was your fourth podium in a row. Do you have a car now that you can compete for the win at every Grand Prix?

CL: Not yet. I think Baku, Monza and probably Singapore as well. These three races have very specific characteristics for cars. So we've got to wait maybe for Austin that will be a bit more of a normal track again to understand whether we've done the steps forward we expected. But in these last two races plus Singapore, we need to maximise the points and take opportunities if we have opportunity to actually win races. Today, I felt like we've missed that opportunity.

Q: OK, bad luck. Thank you, Charles, for that. George, let's come to you now. Very well done as well. Third time on the podium this year for you. After starting P5, what were your expectations coming into the Grand Prix?

GR: Yeah, we thought we could probably fight for P5. But how the race unfolded, we definitely didn't expect. We were really slow in the first stint. I was about one and a half seconds slower than Charles most laps. And it all felt pretty disastrous. But then the last 20 laps of the race, we were a second lap quicker than Piastri and Charles and three or four tenths quicker than Max and Carlos and Checo. So, you know, I'm sort of a bit frazzled as to why that is. The only difference is going from a yellow tyre to a white tyre. And, yeah, we need to understand why, understand further.

Q: Well, you were the only team to run the Hard tyre in practice on Friday. Did that prior knowledge help you?

GR: Not really, to be honest. In practice on Friday… The track's been really dirty this weekend, and the track was about three seconds off the pace on Friday, so I didn't contribute towards it.

Q: Now, Toto came on the radio saying there were a lot of learnings from this weekend. What were the main ones for you, do you think?

GR: Well, we need to understand what happened in the race, because the last stint, we had a car that was comfortably capable of winning this race. And in the first stint, we had a car that probably didn't deserve to be in the top 10. And the only difference is the tyres. We're not the only team to talk about this. It's pretty frustrating for all of us sometimes when you just don't understand the fluctuations in performance between a Q1 and a Q2 session, as an example, or one stint to another. So, yeah, it's a challenge.

Q: Now, you were extremely quick in Singapore last year. Do you fancy your chances there this time around?

GR: I've got no idea, to be honest, because as I said, just in this one race, we had a car that could have won if you took the pace from half of the race and a car that should have been outside the top 10 from the other half. So I hope we've got the faster version.

Q: Alright, George, very well done today. Let's come to our race winner. What a drive, Oscar. So much pressure, yet so much consistency from you as well. How much pleasure does this win give you?

OP: For me, I think that ranks as probably the best win of my career, I would say. Trying to soak up that pressure for so long in that race that was incredibly tough. In the first stint, when Charles was just pulling away pretty comfortably, I thought we were going to be second at best. Even, you know, Checo was keeping me very honest and I could see Carlos was very quick at the end of the medium stint. I saw an opportunity or half an opportunity after the pit stop and knew I had to try and take it. I knew that getting to the lead was going to be one thing, but I knew I had my work cut out for me after that to try and stay there because I didn't feel like we were the quickest in that first stint. It was very hard work. You know, I think having clean air did help quite a bit. But yeah, I think for me has to be one of the best races I've done.

Q: You say clean air did help. But how crucial was it that you took the lead early on in that stint?

OP: It's what won me the race. I felt a bit sorry for my race engineer because I basically tried to do that in the first stint and completely cooked my tyres. So my engineer came on the radio and said, ‘let's not do that again’, basically. And I completely ignored him the next lap and sent it down the inside. I think at that point, you know, I felt like trying to stay back and wait for Charles to deg was never going to happen. I thought we was just going to secure us P2. So, yeah, you know, I had a similar opportunity in the first stint. I felt like on lap two or three, I was, I think, just within DRS, but didn't fully capitalise on that opportunity. And I got to the end of the straight thinking ‘if I had have done a couple of things a bit differently here, I maybe had a chance’. So when I had a similar opportunity after the pit stop, I had to take it. And yeah, I wouldn't be sat here without that.

Q: It was a great opportunity, but you still came from quite far back.

OP: Yeah, it was the only thing I had. If I didn't take that opportunity then I was never going to have another one I think. I mean credit to Charles. He was incredibly fair. I think maybe he thought I was going to sail on into the run-off but I was pleasantly surprised that I actually made the corner. It was a high-risk, high-commitment move but that’s what I needed to do to try and win the race because, you know, I wasn't really going to be that keen to finish second. So I had to try.

Q: Oscar, you're now the top scorer in the last seven races. Do you feel you're building some momentum now?

OP: Yes and no. I mean... Someone else has probably scored the most in the last eight races. Someone else has probably scored the most. For me, cherry-picking these kind of races doesn't mean much for me. I think I have had a good run through the European part of the year and now continuing, but... Yeah, it's not just down to me. We've had a car that's been very quick and consistently quick in a lot of places. And even if we've not necessarily been the outright quickest everywhere, we've been in with a chance everywhere. And I think today was definitely one of those days where we weren't necessarily the quickest, but we had a car that could put us in the fight. We had a pit stop that could put us in the fight. We had some teamwork that put us in the fight. And it all managed to pay off. So yeah, it's obviously not just down to me, but I feel like I've been driving well. You know, it's been clicking a bit more for me this year in terms of the things I want to work on from last season. And you combine that with a car that's capable of winning, and results like this are possible.

QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

Q: (Jake Boxall-Legge – Autosport) A question for Charles, please. Charles, I think after the first stint, you were about six seconds ahead of Oscar before he came in for a stop. And then you come out, and you're basically neck and neck. Can you kind of explain that gap a little bit and how it disappeared?

CL: I think today we've lost the race based on two misjudgements. Obviously the first one I explained earlier and the fact of not fighting Oscar more was a mistake from my side because then with the different configurations we were struggling to actually overtake back in the straight. The second one is exactly this. We expected the undercut today to be a very difficult thing to do, just because we thought that the warm-up on the Hard would be extremely difficult for some reason. I don't really have the explanation yet because I haven't gone into details. I just jumped out of the car, but we've got to look into how the gap went from six seconds to one and a half, because that is definitely not what we expected. And that is a lot. Even on a track where undercuts are big, it's still four seconds and a half or four seconds – a lot of lap time loss, which I don't exactly know why and where we've lost this lap time. So this will be an analysis. But when we speak about that amount of lap time, I think it will be straightforward. And we'll see very quickly whether they just had a much better warm up with the hard than us or whether we've lost it anywhere else.

Q: (Aytan Asgarli - Nargiz Magazine) My question is to you, Charles. You were so close to victory today and you put an amazing effort today on the grid. But if you could change one thing about your race strategy, what would it be for today specifically?

CL: Well, stop a lap earlier. I think that's it, to try and keep the gap to Oscar behind and to not have that pressure when you warm up the tires on a track like this. It's never the position you want to be in. But again, it's always very easy to change things after the race. And today, Oscar and McLaren have done a better job than me and Ferrari. And they deserve to win.

Q: (Jake Boxall-Legge – Autosport) A question for Oscar this time, please. Oscar, when you were defending from Charles, I think it was very, very clear that you had the advantage over him in Sector 1. Was that the most important part of the defence there, building that gap? And how was it that you were able to have so much performance through that section? I get that Charles has already spoken that he was running a little bit more downforce, but from your perspective.

OP: I think for me to be honest the key was actually hanging on in Sector 2. I felt like as long as I could keep the lead into Turn 1 then I felt like I could keep Charles. Turn 2, I think, is a very, very slippery corner for some reason this weekend. and if you could get good enough drive out of there… You know, the straight is not quite long enough to have DRS really make an impact to catch back up. For me, just taking a lot of risk through the castle section is what I was trying to do because I needed to try and make the gap from Turn 7 through the rest of the lap. And yeah, I had a couple of close calls through the castle and Turn 15 as well. I think the guys probably need to put another rear corner on my car after the race. But yeah, that was where I was really trying to be fast and obviously get a good exit out of the last corner. On that note, I think we both need to get a photo of us drifting through the last corner. I was speaking to Mark, and he said it's like 1950s F1. So yeah, that was a cool moment to watch back. It didn't feel very fun at the time for both of us, I'm sure. But yeah, just trying to maximize the pace through the end of Sector 2 really was where I was trying to make it work.

Q: (Haonan Jin – Tencent) A question to Oscar. We heard that the radio during the race from Will to Lando, Will said, imagine Andrea on your shoulder saying, zero spin every exit of the corner. So I was wondering if Tom Stallard said the same thing to you.

OP: No, I didn't get the same the same message. I know exactly what that message means and how it would be communicated. But no, I think they recognised that I was doing everything I could to try and keep Charles behind. For me, I was driving flat out to do that. I didn't have the gap or the space to be able to save my tyres. Of course, I was trying to not destroy them. But yeah, when you're trying to break DRS, you have to push flat out. So that's what I did. And yeah, in the end, it worked.

Q: (Yiyi Duan - Titan Sports) Question to Oscar. You mentioned it was probably one of your most stressful afternoons in your life. So to be more specific, which part did you find the most stressful, even though you explained it in a very calm way?

OP: I think for me, once I got into the lead, which was about two-thirds of the race. Yeah, I knew that getting into the lead was going to be, let's say 40% of the job, but I knew that hanging on to it was going to be 60%. And, you know, I knew that I'd use the tyres pretty heavily to try and get in front, and I knew what kind of impact that had in the first stint, and I was kind of just hoping that the clean air was going to help me stay ahead. And it probably did a little bit, but then obviously you lose a lot of time with DRS, so I think for me, just trying to keep Charles behind was incredibly stressful. You know, I couldn't make a single mistake. I made a couple, but at a track like Baku, it's impossible to be driving flat out and not make any. You know, I was just fortunate that they weren't big enough that it cost me. So, yeah, just the whole 30 laps where I was trying to keep Charles behind was incredibly tough.

Q: (Jake Boxall-Legge – Autosport) Another question for Charles, please. We heard you at one point over the radio and Brian, your engineer, said Plan C. And you said, ‘not stupid’. Can you kind of explain what Plan C was? And were you trying to kind of dummy Oscar into taking a stop that was unnecessary at any point?

CL: I won't go into details of exactly what this plan was, but it wasn't stupid. That's the only thing I can say, really. But yeah, we didn't go for it. But I've already said enough for you to understand what that means. So it was a different plan than what we've done. And it wasn't stupid, but that's it.

GR: How many plans do you have? What letter does it?

CL: It goes until Z. Z.

GR: Not AA?

CL: We are. We are planning everything.