Max Verstappen admitted that he was just "unlucky" to lose out behind the Azerbaijan Grand Prix Formula 1 Safety Car, which cost him a shot at victory. The World Champion sailed past pole-sitter Charles Leclerc with the use of DRS early on as teammate Perez also cleared the Ferrari. However, with the Mexican closing into DRS range, Verstappen dived for the pits when Nyck de Vries hit the Turn 5 wall, breaking his suspension and bringing out the Safety Car. With drivers only losing about 11 seconds when pitting under the Safety Car, Perez was able to leapfrog his teammate to gain the lead. Ultimately, Verstappen could not reel in his teammate, who won to take seven points out of Verstappen's points lead - which now stands at six points.
Verstappen was "unlucky"
"Of course the Safety Car was a bit unlucky, then I had to push again and try to stay very close to try and get within the DRS [of Perez]," Verstappen explained. "But the tyres were overheating a little bit and then of course trying to follow [Perez] with the balance, I was struggling to be really consistent. "I was playing around with the tools a little bit and once I got that settled, I think the last 10 laps or so were quite good, but it was just a little bit too late. "There were a lot of things learnt throughout the race and at the end of the day, [the one-two is] a good team result. "We keep learning, we cannot be perfect all the time, there are always things you can learn. "A few times I hit the wall around the lap, of course we were pushing, but that's also part of [racing] on a street circuit. "We know it is a very long season - and Baku is quite different to [the next race in] Miami, and Miami is quite different to the other tracks we go to."
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