2023 F1 Azerbaijan GP: What does the starting grid look like?

After a month's break, F1 action is back. The focus shifts to the streets of Baku for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. Other than the spectacular middle-aged buildings of the city and the amazing racing experience, a new race weekend format was tested out for the GP.

Since this is a Sprint weekend, a completely new format in is place. It includes only a single practice session, two qualifying sessions (one for sprint and one for the main race), and the main race events. On Friday, the free practice session and qualifying for the race took place, bringing in some electrifying action.

The qualifying session had it all: crashes, multiple red flags, surprising pole position, unexpected disqualifications, and some amazing performances from a few drivers. So here is the provisional grid for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix on Sunday:

Grid Position	Driver Number	Driver	Team
1	16	Charles Leclerc	Ferrari
2	1	Max Verstappen	Red Bull
3	11	Sergio Perez	Red Bull
4	55	Carlos Sainz	Ferrari
5	44	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes
6	14	Fernando Alonso	Aston Martin
7	4	Lando Norris	McLaren
8	22	Yuki Tsunoda	AlphaTauri
9	18	Lance Stroll	Aston Martin
10	81	Oscar Piastri	McLaren
11	63	George Russell	Mercedes
12	31	Esteban Ocon	Alpine
13	23	Alexander Albon	Williams
14	77	Valtteri Bottas	Alfa Romeo
15	2	Logan Sargeant	Williams
16	24	Guanyu Zhou	Alfa Romeo
17	27	Nico Hulkenberg	Haas
18	20	Kevin Magnussen	Haas
19	10	Pierre Gasly	Alpine
20	21	Nyck de Vries	AlphaTauri

Charles Leclerc's pole position came as a surprise because the Monegasque has been having a tough season. Two out of the first three races saw him retiring and he was able to score only six points in total.

Ferrari's qualifying pace was not competitive enough during the Australian GP weekend as well and saw Leclerc qualifying only P7.

However, to much surprise, he was able to beat Max Verstappen in his amazingly fast Red Bull for P1 and became the only F1 driver ever to score three consecutive pole positions.

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Is the new F1 weekend format responsible for the chaos during qualifying?

F1 Grand Prix of Azerbaijan - Practice & Qualifying

F1's new race weekend format, which was agreed upon by the authorities for Azerbaijan, only has a single practice session instead of three. This was blamed by some for the chaos that was caused during the qualifying session.

Nyck de Vries' crash was partly said to have happened because he wasn't acquainted well enough with the track, given it was the first time he was driving around it in an F1 car.

His crash caused a red flag early in the session. At the same time, both Kevin Magnussen and Pierre Gasly suffered from issues during the Free Practice session.

While Gasly's crash wasn't related to his issues with the car that was seen during FP, Magnussen had a similar issue earlier. He could run only six laps during the practice session, and his qualifying ended in a bad way for him and Haas.

While having fewer practice sessions saves time, it also reduces the team's opportunities to work on their cars (if they find a mistake). At the same time, it gives less time to the drivers to make themselves comfortable around a circuit.