Bull

Verstappen, who chose not to do a soft-tyre run because rain was forecast and he wanted to prioritise race preparation, said his day had been a “decent start” and “positive”.

Technical director Pierre Wache added: “We were not very optimistic starting the weekend. The main aspect was to evaluate the package we put in Baku in different type of corners than low speed.

“It looks to be working better than the previous package. Relative performance is difficult to judge but we were surprisingly happy with where we were today.”

Mercedes drivers George Russell and Kimi Antonelli were only seventh and eighth fastest in terms of headline times as they evaluated a major upgrade on their car, the team’s first since the Canadian Grand Prix in June.

Russell said: “I’m feeling the downforce in some of the corners but with this amount of tyre overheating and degradation that trumps everything. So we just need to get on top of that overnight,. That’s more of a set-up rather than the upgrade itself and go from there.’

Asked whether he could compete for pole position on Saturday, Russell said: “Currently, Verstappen looks very fast and the race pace of the McLaren looked very quick but never say never.”

The Briton trails Antonelli by 66 points in the championship after his victory in Azerbaijan last weekend.

On the race simulation runs, Verstappen also looked like the car to beat, taking stint length and tyre wear into account.

But the top four teams all looked to be in close company after a day evaluating tyre wear in the tropical temperatures and on an abnormally abrasive track, where F1 cars last raced in 2017.

Racing Bulls’ Liam Lawson and Alpine’s Pierre Gasly were ninth and 10th.

Three drivers have grid penalties. Hadjar will drop five places from his qualifying position for exceeding the permitted number of engine parts.

And Arvid Lindblad of Racing Bulls and Alpine’s Franco Colapinto will be at the back, the Briton for engine penalties, and the Argentine because of a 10-place engine penalty on top of the five-place penalty he was given for causing a crash at a restart in last weekend’s Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

F1 has returned to this track, regarded as one of the best layouts among the new generation of circuits that came on stream at the end of the last century and into this one, because of the circumstances around this year’s calendar.

The Bahrain and Saudi Arabia races were cancelled at the beginning of the year as a result of the war in the Middle East.

But Bahrain were keen to hold their race and Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa negotiated to hold the race in Malaysia.

A bunch of Bahraini-related activities are being held at the track, while the trophy presented will be the Bahrain Grand Prix trophy and rosewater rather than champagne will be sprayed on the podium.

Frenchman Isack Hadjar is to stay at Red Bull as Max Verstappen’s team-mate for the 2027 season.

The 21-year-old was promoted to the senior team this season after a rookie year with Racing Bulls and has managed to be closer to Verstappen on pace than any team-mate since Daniel Ricciardo in 2018.

His best result this season came with a third place at the Monaco Grand Prix.

Red Bull team principal Laurent Mekies described the move as “an easy decision”.

Mekies said: “Since joining us at the start of the year, Isack has been superb on and off track, especially considering this is only his second F1 season.”

Hadjar returns to Red Bull for this weekend’s Azerbaijan Grand Prix after missing the past three races with a broken wrist, an injury sustained while boxing as part of his training programme.

Mekies added: “You could see from his first weekend in Melbourne that he handled the step up with remarkable composure and had earned his place in this seat.

“The period since his injury has been a difficult one for Isack, but this extension shows how much we believe in him.”

Hadjar said: “I came to this team eight months ago and immediately understood the scale and ambition of this organisation.

“There are so many talented people at the factory, and you’re aware of the privilege of driving for such an incredible team alongside a four-time world champion like Max.

“I’m constantly looking to listen, learn and push myself further every single day, which only makes me more excited about what lies ahead.”

Over the first half of the season, Hadjar was 0.239 seconds slower than Verstappen on average in qualifying and has managed to out-qualify the Dutchman three times, in Australia, Japan and Britain.

In Silverstone Verstappen had a down-on-power engine and in Australia the Dutchman crashed at the start of qualifying.

Verstappen signed a two-year extension to his contract, that now runs to the end of 2030, in August.

SILVERSTONE, England: Max Verstappen needed about 35 minutes to overcome 100 karting drivers in a Red Bull event at Silverstone on Wednesday.

Verstappen started 101st at the Silverstone karting circuit, and overtook 64 drivers on the first lap alone, with many of his opponents crashing among themselves.

Many got blocked on the track after a pile-up that prompted a full-course yellow flag. Verstappen went off track but was able to return.

“That was simply lovely,” Verstappen said. “It was a lot of fun.”

Verstappen, who finished second in Formula 1’s Spanish Grand Prix on Sunday, was up to 37th after the first lap, and up to sixth place by the sixth lap.

He went off track again but stayed comfortably faster than most drivers, none of them with any significant professional driving experience.

He said jokingly that the victory ranked as “the best one yet” in his career.

The discrepancy between the official F1 measurement and the possible shorter distance did not mean that the official measurement was incorrect, the court said.

While it was concluded after the race that a shorter line was possible, the court of appeal ruled that “sporting fairness absolutely precludes the retrospective replacement” of an established calibration parameter “by a different geometric or measurement approach for the purpose of re-adjudicating an individual competitor’s result”.

The controversy arose from the fact that there was a 77-centimetre discrepancy between the officially measured distance of the pit lane and the real shortest route a driver could take.

It was established at Alpine’s appeal in June that Gasly had not exceeded the pit-lane speeding limit by this new measurement, which was why the penalty was overturned.

However, McLaren appealed on the grounds of sporting fairness and their own competitive interests, as Piastri had lost two points as a consequence of the situation.

The Australian was one of several drivers who did serve a five-second pit-lane speeding penalty.

The court of appeal verdict rests on the following conclusions:

Alpine said in a statement: “While we disagree with the decision, and still fully maintain that car 10 (Gasly) did not exceed the pit-lane speed limit at any point during the race, the team acknowledges the decision of the judging panel from the recent hearing in Paris.

“While the result is not what we had hoped for, as we feel that we have been unjustly punished, the team is firmly focused on continuing to improve its performance on track and remains in a close and very competitive championship fight.”

McLaren said: “We welcome the decision of the FIA international court of appeal, a decision which provides important clarity for teams and all the sport’s stakeholders and helps protect the integrity of the sport and trust in its regulatory framework.

“Our appeal was not directed at any competitor or at the FIA. It was brought, and pursued to its conclusion, in the interests of the sport and to support the consistent and fair application of the regulations for all participants.”

The court of appeal did not address the question of whether the pit-lane speeding penalties awarded to Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton, Russell and Piastri were correct under the established measurement, or whether their cars ever physically exceeded the 60km/h limit.

That was not relevant to the bounds of the hearing, which was to address McLaren’s and Red Bull’s protest against the decision to rescind Gasly’s penalty.

Mercedes also contend that Russell never exceeded 60km/h. He was running ahead of Hadjar and Gasly before his first penalty.

He was demoted out of the points because Mercedes failed to correctly serve the penalty at a subsequent pit stop. That offence earned a drive-through penalty which dropped him to 12th place.

Alpine say they have sent the trophy for third place over to Red Bull’s Milton Keynes base, and that they are considering their options as to whether to take the case further.

Their only remaining likely course of action, should they wish to pursue it, would be to go to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.