The European leg of the 2025 F1 World Championship came to an end at Monza, and with it came the shift in both geography and momentum. The summer stretch through the sport’s traditional heartlands had delivered its share of drama, but now Formula 1 left behind the historical tracks for the intensity of its season-closing flyaways. First stop: Baku, the City of Winds. Perched on the Caspian Sea and the beating heart of the Caucasus, Azerbaijan’s capital has carved its own place in F1 folklore since 2016 with its high-speed straights, unforgiving walls, and the kind of unpredictability that can flip the championship on its head. It’s a track that never forgets to punish complacency.
Race Guide
Season: 2025 F1 World Championship
Race weekend: 19 September 2025 – 21 September 2025
Race date: Sunday, 21 September 2025
Race start time: 15:00 local time
Circuit: Baku City Circuit
Laps: 51
Circuit length: 6.003km
2024 winner: Oscar Piastri
| Pole position | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Driver | TBC | TBC | |
| Time | TBC | ||
| Fastest lap | |||
| Driver | TBC | TBC | |
| Time | TBC | ||
| Podium | |||
| First | TBC | TBC | |
| Second | TBC | TBC | |
| Third | TBC | TBC | |
At 6.003 kilometres, the Baku City Circuit is one of the most distinctive challenges on the calendar, threading its way through both the historic heart and modern skyline of Azerbaijan’s capital. With 20 corners—many of them sharp 90-degree bends—this is a track of extremes. On one end, the mile-long main straight is so wide it invites cars to run three-abreast at top speed; on the other, the circuit squeezes into the medieval walls of the old town, where Turn 8 narrows to just seven metres across, leaving drivers with little more than a heartbeat of space.
That duality is exactly why Baku has developed a reputation for chaos. Safety Cars are never far from the conversation here, with even the smallest mistake carrying a heavy price against concrete walls. The speed differential is also one of the biggest in Formula 1: tight, technical sections can drop the pace to 60 km/h, while at the other extreme, Valtteri Bottas once clocked an unofficial F1 record of 378 km/h down the main straight in 2016. Such extremes keep engineers awake at night, as teams are forced to chase an aerodynamic compromise—enough downforce to survive the tightest corners without giving away the raw speed needed to attack in qualifying or defend in race trim. It’s a balancing act that makes Baku one of the most unpredictable and entertaining stops of the season.
Baku Stats
Since its debut in 2016, the Azerbaijan Grand Prix has quickly built a reputation for delivering fresh winners and unpredictable outcomes. In eight editions, seven different drivers have stood on the top step of the podium—a level of variety rare in modern Formula 1. The exception is Sergio Pérez, who has made the streets of Baku something of a personal hunting ground with victories in 2021 and 2023 for Red Bull and was in the hunt in 2024 before disaster struck. Before the 2025 race, the Milton Keynes team remained the most decorated here, also triumphing with Daniel Ricciardo in 2017 and Max Verstappen in 2022. Mercedes, however, had matched their success blow for blow, with Nico Rosberg taking the inaugural race, Lewis Hamilton victorious in 2018, and Bottas winning the year after. McLaren joined the roll of honour in 2024, courtesy of Oscar Piastri and his breakthrough win on the shores of the Caspian.
If race-day glory has been evenly shared, qualifying tells a different story—and one name dominates it. Charles Leclerc had been the undisputed master of Saturdays in Baku, taking four consecutive pole positions between 2021 and 2024, often against the odds with machinery not always considered the fastest in the field. Before his reign, Nico Rosberg, Lewis Hamilton, Sebastian Vettel, and Valtteri Bottas each claimed a single pole apiece. On the broader podium picture, Pérez again led the way with five career rostrums at this circuit, followed by Vettel with three. Among the teams, Mercedes’ consistency shone through with seven total podiums, narrowly ahead of Red Bull’s six, while Ferrari—powered largely by Leclerc’s heroics—had five to their name.
Weekend Schedule
| Date | Session | Local Time |
|---|---|---|
| 19 September 2025 | Free Practice 1 (FP1) | 12:30 pm – 1:30 pm local time |
| 19 September 2025 | Free Practice 2 (FP2) | 4:00 pm – 5:00 pm local time |
| 20 September 2025 | Free Practice 3 (FP3) | 12:30 pm – 1:30 pm local time |
| 20 September 2025 | Qualifying | 3:00 pm – 4:00 pm local time |
| 21 September 2025 | Race | 3:00 pm local time |
In Saturday qualifying…
In Sunday’s race…
Championship background
Round 17 of the 2025 F1 World Championship arrived with McLaren’s title fight very much alive and tightening. Oscar Piastri still led the standings, but his cushion over team-mate Lando Norris had been trimmed to 31 points after the 2025 Italian Grand Prix, where the Briton capitalised on stronger pace and a late-race team orders tangle to finish ahead. The weekend wasn’t without frustration for McLaren—an untimely pit-stop error left Norris fuming—but their bigger setback came at the hands of Red Bull. Max Verstappen, quiet by his own high standards in recent races, roared back with a commanding win, handing the Woking (McLaren) squad just their fourth race-day defeat of the year.
History suggested Baku could offer just as much intrigue. In 2024, Verstappen endured a rare off weekend here, opening the door for Piastri to announce himself as a future title contender with a measured drive that toppled Charles Leclerc, despite the Ferrari driver’s fourth consecutive pole at the venue. Norris, meanwhile, fought through from 15th on the grid to fourth, a recovery that underlined McLaren’s strength. With the 2025 Constructors’ Championship now pretty much wrapped up and in McLaren’s grasp, pressure on both its drivers would only intensify. And in Baku, pressure has a way of finding cracks—just ask Sergio Pérez and Carlos Sainz, whose late-race crash for the podium in 2024 left the race ending under a Virtual Safety Car. On a circuit built for drama, the title fight may just find its sharpest edges yet.
Race entries
The lineup of drivers and teams remained the same as the 2025 season’s entry list, apart from:
- A driver swap at the sister teams, Red Bull Racing and Racing Bulls, where Yuki Tsunoda moved up to the parent Red Bull team and Liam Lawson headed in the opposite direction back to Racing Bulls, for round three at the 2025 Japanese Grand Prix.
- Jack Doohan stepping out of the race seat at Alpine (post Miami), beginning with the following round, the 2025 Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix. The team confirmed that former Williams and Alpine reserve driver, Franco Colapinto, would take his place alongside number one driver, Pierre Gasly.
Aside from these changes, all the drivers from the start of the season took to the track during FP1, FP2, FP3, Qualifying, and the Grand Prix.
Tyre choices
Pirelli took an aggressive approach to Baku in 2025, bringing its softest trio of compounds for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix—a step down in durability from 2024. The return of the C6 as the Soft, having already featured earlier this season at Imola, Monaco, and Montreal. That made the C5 the Medium and the C4 the Hard for the weekend. On a circuit where grip is scarce and wear levels are traditionally low, sticking with last year’s allocation would almost certainly have locked the race into a predictable one-stop. By shifting softer, Pirelli had opened the door to a possible two-stop showdown, especially with the 2025 compounds proving far less susceptible to graining. Teams had also sharpened their tyre management this year—Monza being the latest example—so strategies ahead of the race could have still converged, but the softer step could still create windows for bold calls under pressure.
Baku’s unique mix of high-speed straights and tight corners added another layer of complexity. While the low grip encourages drivers to push the rubber longer, those 2km blasts at full throttle pile vertical load into the tyres, demanding careful balancing acts from the engineers.
In 2024, most of the grid started on the Medium (C4), with just a handful—including Lando Norris and Alex Albon—gambling on the Hard. A one-stop was the expectation, but as always in Baku, there were exceptions: Lance Stroll was forced into an extra stop with a puncture, while Max Verstappen and Pierre Gasly switched late in pursuit of the fastest lap, the latter even stretching his Hard stint to 50 laps before bolting on Softs with two to go. That blend of conservative baseline strategy and opportunistic gambles is exactly what makes tyre calls in Azerbaijan such a decisive factor—one wrong move here, and even the strongest weekends can unravel in an instant.
FIND OUT MORE
Free Practice
FP1 report post-session.
FP2 report post-session.
FP2 report post-session.
Free Practice 1 Classification
FP1 of the 2025 Azerbaijan Grand Prix was held on 19 September 2025 from 12:30 pm to 1:30 pm local time.
Free Practice 2 Classification
FP2 of the 2025 Azerbaijan Grand Prix was held on 19 September 2025 from 4:00 pm to 5:00 pm local time.
Free Practice 3 Classification
FP3 of the 2025 Azerbaijan Grand Prix was held on 20 September 2025 from 12:30 pm to 1:30 pm local time.
Qualifying
Full report post-session.
Full Qualifying Report
Qualifying Classification
Qualifying for the 2025 Azerbaijan Grand Prix was held on 20 September 2025 from 4:00 pm to 5:00 pm local time.
2025 Azerbaijan Grand Prix Starting Grid
The Grand Prix starting grid, with or without penalties, after the 2025 Azerbaijan Grand Prix Qualifying session.
What happened in the 2025 Azerbaijan Grand Prix?
Full race report post-session.
2025 Azerbaijan Grand Prix race results
The 2025 Azerbaijan Grand Prix Race was held on 21 September 2025 at 3:00 pm local time.
2025 Post-Race F1 Championship Standings
Championship standings for Drivers’ and Teams after the 2025 Azerbaijan Grand Prix.
2025 Post-Race F1 Drivers’ Championship Standings
2025 Post-Race F1 Constructors’ Championship Standings
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