Vasseur reveals why Ferrari's encouraging weekend in Baku took a massive hit in qualifying

Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur has revealed why Ferrari's encouraging weekend in Baku took a massive hit in qualifying, claiming that the change in weather conditions

Ferrari looked quick on the opening day at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix and seemed to have carried over that form to qualifying day, with both Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc having displayed a competitive performance in the third and final practice.

The British and the Monegasque driver posted impressive lap times in Q1, but their session started to go wrong in Q2. On their initial runs Leclerc went wide, wrecking his lap but also his team mate’s as Hamilton was forced to abort thanks to the resultant yellow flags.

Coming back out as the clock ticked down, Leclerc did enough to make Q3 on Pirelli's medium tyres. However, Hamilton was left out on his worn soft tyres, and the seven-time world champion was unable to make it out of Q2.

All eyes were set on Leclerc, but the Monegasque, who always goes well at Baku, crashed just as the rain started to fall in Q3, bringing out the red flags and failing to set a lap time.

The disappointing result leaves Leclerc and Hamilton to start from a disappointing P10 and P12, respectively which is a far cry from what the Scuderia hoped for after the highs of yesterday.

Commenting on the Scuderia's tough day at Baku, team boss Fred Vasseur said, "There’s a feeling of frustration after this qualifying, because yesterday we had very strong pace over a long run and on the single lap.

"Today, conditions were different with much strong gusts of wind and it was cooler, which made it more difficult to get the tyres in the right window, but it was the same for everybody so that cannot be an excuse. We struggled to put everything together. Charles had decent pace and was doing a good job, but then he touched the wall.

The Frenchman continued: "I think he was caught out by a gust of wind between the buildings and in this situation it’s easy to make a mistake, especially when conditions change from one lap to the next. He was not the only one today.

"It is what it is and now we must focus on the race. It’s also true that today it wasn’t clear cut which was best, between the soft and the medium; pole was set on the soft, Carlos [Sainz] was second on medium."