Portugal Colonial - Perez wins Azerbaijan Grand Prix sprint as Verstappen sees red

Red Bull's double world champion was seething over a first lap incident when he was muscled out of third place by the Mercedes of George Russell.

Perez won from pole-sitter Charles Leclerc of Ferrari with Verstappen, whose car picked up some damage, eventually getting his third place back off Russell.

The British driver apologised to Verstappen, saying his car had no grip but the Dutch driver snapped back: "Mate, we all have no grip, we all need to leave space!"

Verstappen added later: "I just don't understand why you need to take so much risk in lap 1, understeer in my side pod and create a hole, we all have cold tyres, it's always easy to lock up.

"But in this beautiful way of explaining mate, locked up, or look at the onboard, it doesn't make sense. We still got into P3, got some good points, but it is what it is."

Russell stood his corner, remarking: "I was surprised why he was so angry to be honest, he still finished the race in P3.

"I was still quite surprised he was trying to hold it round the outside, you know we're on a street circuit, he's got a lot more to lose than I have. None of the contact was intentional."

That mini storm on the banks of the Caspian Sea took some of the gloss off Perez's win.

The Mexican was adding this first of six sprint races in 2023 to his win in the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, with Verstappen taking the season-opener in Bahrain and last time out in Melbourne.

Leclerc is on pole again on Sunday for the fourth round of the season but judged on this display he will have his work cut out again to clip the Red Bulls' wings.

In the drivers' championship Verstappen leads on 75 points from Perez on 62 with Leclerc picking up seven points - more than he's earned in the three races run so far.

Leclerc fended off Perez in the short run to the first corner as Russell overtook Verstappen at turns two and three.

Yuki Tsunoda's AlphaTauri then lost a rear tyre which nonchalantly rolled its way down the straight, coming to a stop eventually at turn 16 as the safety car came out.

The safety car came in on lap six of 17, Leclerc keeping his lead on the restart, with Verstappen taking back third from Russell.

With 10 laps to go Perez picked off Leclerc, Red Bull's straight line speed helping the Mexican sweep past the Ferrari.

- 'Step forward' -

Perez picked his way safely around the tricky circuit over the closing laps for a comfortable win.

"It was good, with these tricky sessions it's been a lot of pressure on us, our team, our engineers, mechanics and drivers, so to get away with maximum points today was the main objective but obviously we know that tomorrow is the main race," said the sprint winner.

Leclerc was encouraged Ferrari had taken "a step forward".

"We are still not where we want to be but as I said, if winning is not possible then we just need to take the maximum points," he said.

"And today there wasn't anything more. Happy with the second place and we will try and go for the win tomorrow."

His teammate Carlos Sainz came in fifth ahead of Fernando Alonso, Lewis Hamilton and Lance Stroll picking up one point in eighth.

"I like that we're trying something new with this format. The extra qualifying session was fun," said Hamilton who was second last time out in Australia.

"The sprint race was less exciting but that's probably because I was struggling."

After this Baku edition, sprints will feature again in Austria, Belgium, Qatar, Austin and Interlagos.

But more immediately is the little matter of Sunday's fourth round of the world championship with Leclerc on pole and the Red Bulls waiting to pounce.

X.M.Francisco--PC