Reigning championship leader Max Verstappen entered the eighth round of the motorsport top-flight season intent on regaining victory after his third-place finish in the chaotic Monaco Grand Prix race.
However, another aspect was of more concern to the Dutch driver himself and his team, the recurring DRS problems seemed to have come to an end on the streets of Monte Carlo, with senior Red Bull officials claiming they had found a 100% effective solution.
Despite this, they recognized that the definitive test would come in Baku, since the track that hosts the Azerbaijan Grand Prix race registers one of the highest speeds on the calendar with a kilometric straight that would really put the RB18 ‘s DRS to the test, since that the characteristics of Montecarlo were not the most adequate to evaluate this problem.
In the first free practice session, the mobile rear wing of the #1 car once again suffered some problem or another and, although it did not slam shut as it did in the Spanish GP, it vibrated noticeably.
Ahead of Free Practice 2, Red Bull ‘s mechanics made a number of changes that ultimately seemed to avoid or at least alleviate the problem: “Yeah, they tried to fix it of course, and I don’t think I heard anything during FP2, so I guess that was fine,” Verstappen said.
Speaking more in reference to performance, the Dutch driver said that he saw Ferrari stronger in short runs, but that in race simulations the paces looked very similar. In addition, he was really happy with the performance of the tires in one lap, one of the problems with the RB18 at the start of the season.
“Yeah, just a little bit of bad luck on my laps on the soft tires in FP1 and FP2, I always saw a yellow flag so I had to brake, but overall I think we’re pretty good.
“It seems that Ferrari is quite quick over one lap again, on long runs then we look a bit more even. So that’s a positive. And yes, for once it looks like on a street circuit we can get the tires to work at a lap”, concluded Max Verstappen .
