Esteban Ocon faced a frustrating weekend at the F1 Azerbaijan Grand Prix in Baku. The Haas driver showed flashes of pace in practice, finishing as high as eighth in FP2, but was disqualified from qualifying after failing a rear wing deflection test. However, despite dropping to the back of the grid, Ocon climbed six places in the race and finished 14th.
Difficult start and strategy gamble
Ocon’s race was compromised almost immediately, as he made contact with Nico Hülkenberg on the opening lap. The German clipped the right rear of Ocon’s Haas, forcing the Frenchman into an unscheduled pit stop for medium tyres.
Reflecting on the incident, Ocon told the media, “Yeah, luckily for both of us there was not much damage on the car. It’s just really the wheel that contacted everything, so that was better. Anyways, we didn’t get much out of that race.”
A second stop on lap 2 left Ocon attempting to go until the end of the race with his new hard tyres. A strategy that ultimately proved challenging.
Struggling on long stints
Ocon admitted that the decision to run long was not pre-planned. “Yeah, tried to cycle the tyres. Yeah, to discuss with the team it was not something we really planned like that. So, yeah, we will understand in the office a bit more what led to that. Obviously it was very difficult at the end. Even though, you know, the deg is quite low, I still couldn’t keep up with the others with fresher tyres.”
Although Ocon has often attempted extended tyre stints in 2025, such as in Jeddah and Shanghai, he noted that this race was particularly difficult. Running long with no Safety Car over 49 laps proved challenging. “Yeah, well, if we were starting in the front, we would not do that,” he added.
Singapore hope
Summing up the F1 Azerbaijan GP, Ocon described it as a challenging one. “So, yeah, it was a tricky race, but it’s been a tricky weekend the whole weekend. There’s a lot of things to review and hopefully we can come back stronger in Singapore. Yeah, there’s a lot more corners, a lot less straight, so I hope that this will be a better thing for us.”
