What to expect from Azerbaijan 2018

After 3 very different races and the terrific Chinese GP, we can't wait for the 2018 Azerbaijan grand prix. This race is held on the streets of the capital Baku. The city of Baku is located on the Caspian Sea.

The 2018 season is turning out into a very interesting Formula 1 season. In Melbourne Mercedes looked very strong with Lewis Hamilton, but Sebastian Vettel stole the victory away with a perfectly timed safety car pitstop.

In Bahrain Ferrari was very strong with Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen until he did the pitstop were his mechanic broke his leg. Vettel nursed his tyres perfectly and wasn't suppose to pit only once. Bottas almost passed Vettel in the last lap of the race, but wasn't able to find a gap.

In China Ferrari looked to be the favourites to win the race again, but a deploying safety car again caused a very different outcome. Red Bull Racing was the only top team that had the balls to do a 2 cars pitstop which resulted almost in a 1-2 finish. Daniel Ricciardo's brilliant drive took him back to the 2018 drivers championship fight, while Max Verstappen had a bad day in the office. Nevertheless he scored 10 valuable points for himself and the team.

2018 Azerbaijan Facts & Figures

With 6.003 km the Baku street circuit the second longest circuit of this 2018 F1 season, only Spa-Francorchamps 1 km longer. The Baku circuit is driven anticlockwise and has the most narrow piece of circuit of the calendar.

The upwards section towards the gates, that looks like a castle is the most narrow piece of F1 circuit. A lot of drivers damaged their car there in the previous 2 races.

The Baku street circuit holds 20 corners. Most corners are 90º turns and turn 7 is even more than ninety degrees. The asphalt is quite slippery and very smooth. This street circuit has the least tyre wear of all 2018 circuits.

The circuit has two DRS sections. The long finish straight is 2.2 km long. On this straight the F1 cars can generate the highest top speeds of the season. During qualifying in 2016, Valtteri Bottas reached a topspeed of 378 km/h in the Williams FW38. He now holds the record for the highest recorded speed with an F1 car.

Sebastian Vettel holds the official lap record of 1:43.441 min. It was set in last years race in the Ferrari SF70H.

The race is held since 2016 and is the last event that was added to the F1 calendar. It replaced the former Korean Grand Prix. The podium of the Azerbaijan has always been a surprise. In 2016 Sergio Pérez scored his last podium here with a 3rd place for Force India. In 2017 it was Lance Stroll who scored his first podium here with a 3rd place. He lost 2nd place to Valtteri Bottas on the finish line, because he slowed down to early.

Of all current drivers only Daniel Ricciardo won this race. The first winner was ex-F1 driver Nico Rosberg.

Compared to last year, the selection of tyres that Pirelli brings to Baku are two steps softer, with soft, supersoft and ultrasoft to choose from. One step comes from the actual selection, the next from the fact that all the compounds are a step softer than their 2017 equivalents anyway. The most important difference this year is that the Azerbaijan Grand Prix is being held two months earlier and we expect cooler conditions.

With the race starting just after 4pm, track temperatures cool rapidly as the sun begins to go down. None of the free practice sessions take place at exactly the same time as the race start though.

Because Baku is a street circuit tightly enclosed by buildings, there are many areas of lights and shade, making track temperatures even harder to assess. The main straight is two kilometres long, which means that the tyres can cool down before the braking area at the end of it.

Last years 2017 Azerbaijan GP

2017 Top three finishers, Daniel Ricciardo, Valtteri Bottas and Lance Stroll

The 2017 Azerbaijan race was a very entertaining and action packed race. It was held 2 months later than the 2018 edition and was a very crazy race. Both Finns Bottas and Raikkonen collided in the second corner of the first lap, that caused him a flat right front tyre and had to pit.

Daniel Ricciardo also had to pit early in lap 6, because he got debris in his brake-ducts that overheated his brakes very quickly. In lap 12 Kvyat's retirement caused a safety car period, Verstappen retired with an engine failure and the Vettel/Hamilton brake test incident happened. Vettel ran into the Mercedes of Hamilton.

After the restart both Force India drivers Esteban Ocon and Sergio Pérez collided in the same corner that Raikkonen and Bottas did and the race was red flagged due to to much debris on the track.

After the restart Daniel Ricciardo who drove death last in lap 6 had passed a lot cars already on the main straight he passed 3 cars in 1 move into 3rd place.

Then both drivers who drove 1st and 2nd vanished in front of Ricciardo, Hamilton's pitted to fix a loose headrest and Vettel got a 10 sec. penalty for his run into Hamilton earlier. Ricciardo won the race (his only one in 2017) and even Bottas who pitted in lap 2 after having a puncture finished on the podium.

Baku Weather Forecast

baku weather forcast

The weather prediction for Baku this weekend looks to be warmer than expected. On Friday it will be dry, partly clouded and 22ºC with light breeze.

Saturday will show very similar weather as Friday. On race day Sunday there will be overcast with  a lower temperature of 19ºC and and bit more wind.

Who will be on the 2018 Azerbaijan podium?

Looking at the performance of the top teams in the first 3 races it's becoming very hard to predict an outcome. The race in Baku will definitely have a safety car period and tyre strategies will be counting on it. Because overtaking is not difficult in Baku, qualifying isn't very important this weekend.

Looking at the high speed track of Baku, Ferrari with championship leader Sebastian Vettel looks very promising with a great tyre management, the highest top speed of the grid (China 343 km/h). If you want to bet on the Baku Grand Prix betting odds than you should consider Vettel and Ferrari as favourite.

Vettel leads the drivers championship with 9 points on Hamilton, 14 points to Bottas and 17 to Ricciardo.

Mercedes looks to be struggling with the 2018 Pirelli tyres. They just can't get them into the ideal temperature performance window. Looking at the temperatures this weekend, the Mercedes W09 will perform much better than in China. We all know Hamilton won't give up that easily, so Baku could become a turning point for him. He also never scored a podium here, so he definitely will be motivated to score his first podium in Baku.

Hamilton also can extend his record of conservative point finishes. He can get it up to 29 if he finishes in the points on Sunday.

If the Renault power unit of Red Bull doesn't fails we also could see the slipstream overtaking king Daniel Ricciardo coming to the front. Hopefully Dutchman Max Verstappen has found some peace with the errors he made in Bahrain and China and is able to treat us on a great race again. Except for the first laps in China we haven't seen much of him yet in the 2018 season.

Our prediction for Baku is: 1. Vettel, 2. Ricciardo, 3 Hamilton

Below you can find the tyre choices that each driver did for the whole weekend.

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