The Azerbaijan Grand Prix is live on 5 Live and on the BBC Sport website
Lewis Hamilton was left “a little sore” after his Mercedes had trouble bouncing on the straights during training sessions on Friday at the Azerbaijani Grand Prix.
“I’ll make it,” he said after finishing the 12th faster. “We’re getting significant speeds at the end of the straight and it’s bouncing a lot.”
His teammate George Russell said the new rules needed to be rethought.
“I don’t think it’s right to run like that for the next four years or whatever we have,” Russell said.
“Conversations will be needed because everyone is on the same boat.”
Bounces on the straights, caused by an interruption in the flow of air under the car body, have affected most teams to some extent this year after the introduction of new rules aimed at closing the field and facilitating overtaking.
These have changed the way car aerodynamics work and caused the rebound problem, which Mercedes is struggling with more than most.
The world champions had hoped to be overtaken with some changes made for the Spanish Grand Prix two races ago, but this weekend it has returned to the long pit straight in Baku, which has a series of eliminated twists.
Russell, director of the Grand Prix Drivers Association, said: “Now the car is so close to the ground that it’s crazy for these high-speed laps.
“The car is bottoming out and I think it’s the same for everyone and it’s not really comfortable to drive. I don’t know what the future holds for this era of cars, but I don’t see us being able to do that. [continue like this]. “
The two Ferraris also seemed to have trouble bouncing on the straights.
No other driver complained to the same extent as the Mercedes partner, although Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz admitted that he was also struggling with the problem, which is also known as “porpoise”.
Sainz said: “It is definitely something I am investigating because today, for some reason, I struggled a lot with this phenomenon that has not been there in recent races and I found it especially bad next to my garage.
“It’s something I have to deepen with the engineers. It took me a little bit of confidence in the straights and the braking.”
F1 general manager Ross Brawn, who was central to the introduction of the new rules, have changed the way car aerodynamics work this year with the aim of closing the field and facilitating overtaking, as has previously rejected similar comments from Russell. , saying he was only really interested in the thoughts of the drivers at the head of the field.
Following the changes in the structure of F1, Brawn’s team that developed the rules has been transferred and now works for the governing body of the FIA.
Russell was Mercedes’ fastest driver, in seventh place and 1.3 seconds behind Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, with Hamilton 0.3 seconds behind.
Hamilton said: “We tried something experimental with my car and it didn’t look great, to be honest. But at least we tested it and got data on it. We’ll check it out and hopefully we’ll get back to it tomorrow. that we have changed.
“1.6 seconds or 1.3 seconds or whatever; that’s a long way off. A lot of it is on the straights.”
Lewis Hamilton seemed to be struggling with his Mercedes
Ferrari and Red Bull close again
Leclerc finished the day 0.248 seconds faster than the Red Bull of Monaco Grand Prix winner Sergio Pérez, and the Ferrari driver said he had a “good Friday”.
Leclerc’s title rival Max Verstappen was 0.108 seconds behind. Fernando Alonso, whose Alpine presented a significant aerodynamic improvement this weekend, was the fourth fastest, surpassing Carlos Sainz’s second Ferrari.
Leclerc said the nature of the sessions meant that understanding the real picture of the performance was difficult.
“I think it will be [a hard fight at the top]”We have improved a lot from P1 to P2,” said Leclerc, “but there is still one more step to take tomorrow.”
“I also feel that in P2 no one did a lap, neither did we, but Max and Carlos didn’t improve on the soft ones, so there are still a lot of questions.
“The good thing about today is that the degradation was good and the pace of the race was very strong, so that’s good.”
Leclerc has seen a 46-point lead over Verstappen after three races this season turned into a nine-point deficit after four straight Red Bull victories and a series of problems for Ferrari.
But he said he believed he could regain the lead as the season progressed.
“If we make everything perfect, I’m sure we’ll get it [the lead] at some point, “Leclerc said.
At race pace, Ferrari and Red Bull looked very evenly matched in Baku.
Red Bull had seen the team beat in the first session, in which Perez was the fastest and when he and Verstappen were clearly faster on the straights, a key factor on a track where they are so long and overtaking is relatively simple.
But Ferrari’s deficit on the straights narrowed in the second session, and Leclerc moved back to his usual position this season as a one-lap pace marker.
Verstappen came out on the court late in the second session when Red Bull made repairs to his rear wing, after fluctuating when the DRS forward aid opened during the first session.
Later, their classification simulations were interrupted by traffic. And he only managed to complete two laps in the race adjustment at the end of the session.
However, Perez appeared to be the most comfortable Red Bull driver during the day, as Verstappen complained about the understeer in the first session and then appeared to be struggling with a loose back early in the second.
Therefore, Pérez seems ready to continue his good form, after his victory in Monaco last time.
Perez said: “It was a good start to the day, P2 didn’t go as well as we would have liked. I think we probably took the wrong directions, or we were just exploring and we can’t detect our problems.
“But we have the data for both tires in the long runs. Hopefully, we can put it all together for qualifying. I feel confident.”
Behind Sainz, Alpha Tauri’s Pierre Gasly was sixth fastest ahead of Russell, with teammate Yuki Tsunoda of France eighth, and Esteban Oco.ni’s second Alpine Lando Norris of McLaren.