Check drivers' statements after Friday's Azerbaijan F1 2022 GP

Sergio Pérez started the day maintaining the good momentum from Monaco, when he won the F1 race on the streets of Monte Carlo. On Friday (10), the Mexican led the first free practice session of the Azerbaijan GP, the eighth round of the 2022 Formula 1 season, indicating a slight advantage for Red Bull in a fight that promised (and promises) to be tight against Ferrari.

Well, the Italian team made sure to give back soon after. Charles Leclerc responded promptly and led the second practice of the day in Baku: Ferrari alive and, at least, on equal footing to fight for pole-position on Saturday.

A once again timid Max Verstappen was only third in the two sessions, while Carlos Sainz had an even worse performance: 4th and 5th, respectively. At least on the first day of action in Azerbaijan, the protagonists are indeed Leclerc and Pérez.

The 'best of the rest' position went to Fernando Alonso. The Spaniard finished the two free practices of the day, which marked the beginning of Formula 1 activities in Azerbaijan, within the top-5: 5th in the first session and 4th in TL2. At the same time, the two-time world champion was, in both sessions, the fastest driver in the last sector of the street track in Baku.

GRANDE PRÊMIO follows all the activities of the Azerbaijan GP LIVE and IN REALTIME. On Saturday, TL3 is scheduled for 8am (GMT-3), while qualifying starts at 11am.

Check out the statements from the 20 drivers on the F1 grid:

Charles Leclerc, first: Leclerc downplays lead, but sees "solid day" for Ferrari on Friday in Baku

Sergio Pérez, second: Pérez says he is "confident" and appreciates Red Bull's performance in free practice in Baku

Max Verstappen, third: Verstappen sees "decent" start in Baku and regrets yellow flags on fast laps

Fernando Alonso, fourth: Alonso sees Alpine fast in Baku, but scales back expectations: "Rooting for Q3

Carlos Sainz, fifth: Sainz cites "uncomfortable" TL1 and says Ferrari found "the right direction" in TL2 in Baku

Pierre Gasly, sixth: Gasly is pleased with pace in Baku, but says there is still "something more" missing for qualifying

George Russell, seventh: Russell sees "tricky day" in Baku and Mercedes "inherently slower"

Yuki Tsunoda, eighth: "I think the whole Friday went well for us. We are very happy with what we were able to do and the performance of the car so far. We gathered a lot of important data in the two sessions today, so we'll be leaving for analysis with the engineers tonight. We've been consistently in the top-10 and I hope we can continue that tomorrow."

Esteban Ocon, ninth: "We had a decent day overall. Baku is a place where you really need to make the most of these practice sessions and do very fast laps, meaning confidence is key around here, similar to Monaco. There are a lot of braking points that you need to get right, otherwise you lose time. The car looks competitive after today, but we will have to go all out tomorrow.

Lando Norris, tenth: "What a tough day! Although we made some small progress with the car, overall we had a lot of difficulties because of the wind, which makes the sessions very difficult to understand. Because of the lack of consistency, we are all in the same boat, and I think we made good progress. However, we need to go a little further. We will analyze all the data tonight and take lessons from what was done today to try to move forward tomorrow."

Sebastian Vettel, 11th: Vettel sees solidity in Aston Martin after free practice in Baku: "Encouraging day"

Lewis Hamilton, 12th: Hamilton again complains about kicks and sees Leclerc away: "I don't know where he is 1s6"

Lance Stroll, 13th: "We had a successful practice session, learned a lot, and got some good lap times that can be achieved at the weekend. Although I 'scraped' the barrier, fortunately it didn't affect our performance: nothing was broken, so I was able to get away with it. It was all about getting into the rhythm of the track and finding the limits. I really like this track, really, I find it a fun challenge, so I'm really looking forward to coming back here tomorrow."

Daniel Ricciardo, 14th: "It was a day with mixed feelings, after all, we tried during the morning session a different setup, but we were a bit behind after that session. We had good reasons to try those new features. But seeing the performance, we changed the settings for TL2 and were certainly more competitive. Now, it's fine-tuning here and there, although at least I felt that there was definitely more potential in the car in the afternoon, so I feel more comfortable in this setting. I think we can take a step forward tomorrow."

Valtteri Bottas, 15th: "We progressed very well throughout the day, although it was a bit tricky at the start, with grip levels and car balance quite off. The track feels a bit bumpier than last year, but nothing to worry about: fortunately we didn't have any problems with the kicks. We made some setup changes during the day, and in the end our car was much better. I'm sure there is more to unlock and I didn't get many clean laps either, including the final one in TL2: I fried my tire and lost the lap. As usual, sector 2 is very 'tight' and I'm sure we can take a step forward for tomorrow. I'm optimistic for qualifying and the rest of the weekend.

Guanyu Zhou, 16th: "I had a nice day, I like this track and feel I got used to it reasonably fast, especially compared to my experiences in Jeddah and Monte Carlo. I enjoyed the laps and didn't make any mistakes, so I'm happy with that, although obviously we still have things we need to work on as a team. I'm confident that we can take a step forward for tomorrow's qualifying, after all, the battle in the middle of the pack between P10 and P16 is extremely tight, so if we can get a few tenths we can make a big gain in grid positions. There are many factors at play, but we know we can be in this fight. We will be giving everything we can to make it happen.

Kevin Magnussen, 17th: "It's a nice track to drive, I love it here. It's a street track and it's always a little more exciting, a little more on the limit. The car feels pretty good, actually, but in TL2 we weren't very fast, which is a bit surprising, to drop that much after TL1. Normally, we tend to be better in TL2 than in TL1 and today it was the opposite, so we need to analyze this and see if we can find something. I'm still sure we'll have a pretty crazy race where a lot of things can happen."

Alexander Albon, 18th: "We had an okay day today. It's been a bit tricky for us, because the car was good. It felt like one of the best setups we've had this year so far. This pace we found is a little bit confusing, so we need to understand what's going on. We have work to do. Let's analyze the data and see what can be done."

Mick Schumacher, 19th: "It looks like the water leak problem we had came from the kicks on the first lap, and that ended the plan. It's the first time physically that I've felt the effect of that, it hurts the body quite a bit and hurts the car as well, so it's definitely something to think about for the next few races. This track in general is quite light on the tires, except obviously the temperature of the circuit is quite high. It will be interesting to analyze it further today so that we have a good overview of the race."

Nicholas Latifi, 20th: "We didn't have a great day of practice, after all, we missed most of TL1 because of an electronic problem. In general, on street tracks you don't want to lose any races, but especially on this circuit, your confidence must be at its peak in order not to lose time at the braking points. There is still a lot to be done for me, so we will do our homework tonight to better understand which way to go with the car. We will maximize every moment to prepare for qualifying.