Today's post-race press conference with Oscar Piastri, Charles Leclerc and George Russell.

Track Interviews - Conducted by Guenther Steiner

Q: George, congratulations. Fantastic job. How surprised are you to be here on the podium today?
George Russell: Yeah, definitely surprised. Glad to see Carlos and Checo are OK, but I think there was so much hard work this weekend for everybody in the team. There was engine changes on my side, engine changes for Lewis, so much going on. Everybody was working so hard. And we had a really bad start to the race. I was dropping off a lot. But on the Hard tyre, I think we were one of the quickest out there. And that was great. Got past Max. So an added bonus to stand on the podium.

Q: What was the most difficult moment for you in the race? Because as you said, you felt...
GR: Driving full gas into a wall of carbon fibre on the penultimate lap. I mean, that was pretty crazy. The sun was coming down. You couldn't see anything. I was shocked the Safety Car or VSC didn't come out sooner. You know, the car could have been anywhere. So, as I said, glad to see everybody was OK. It was a long old race and glad to be on the podium.

Q: Absolutely. Glad for the whole team that you get on the podium. And I think we now have got four manufacturers which can go for the podium. Do you think you can keep in there for the next races?
GR: I mean, we've got to be realistic still. We should have finished fifth today. That was the true result. Obviously, with Lando's qualifying yesterday, he probably would have been up there as well. So I don't want to get carried away with ourselves with this podium today. We've got a lot of work to do. Hopefully, Singapore is a slightly better weekend.

Q: Thanks a lot, George, and all the best. Enjoy it. Charles, congratulations. Again a podium. A very tough race for you, obviously, but it's a second place. So when did you realise that you really cannot get him?
Charles Leclerc: I think as soon as we put the Hard tyres. On the medium, we were very competitive and the car felt good. Unfortunately, we didn't do any high-fuel running on my side in FP1, FP2, and we went for a setup direction that maybe in the race was a bit more difficult to manage. Especially on the hard tyres. I was really struggling to just keep those rear tyres, and towards the end, I really thought that, yeah, in one corner or two, I thought that I would put it in the wall. It was very close. But second, today, McLaren and Oscar have done an exceptional job and have been better than us. It's obviously a huge shame for Carlos in the last lap, but hopefully everybody is OK. But, yeah, not obviously another great day for the team.

Q: Yeah, but you had a big fight, and you were fighting hard out there. How enjoyable was that, you know, to be there, for it to be possible to win? Obviously, you didn't in the end, but how enjoyable is that?
CL: It is enjoyable because you've got many opportunities every laps. I think maybe McLaren had a little bit less downforce. In the straights, they were very quick. In the corners, we were a bit quicker. But at the end, I thought that when Oscar overtook me, I was like, 'OK, now it's just a matter of staying calm, trying to keep those tyres and overtake him again later on'. But actually, it was a lot more difficult than that. In the straights, I couldn't get as close as I wanted. And yeah, and eventually, to be honest, we lost the race where I didn't quite defend as well as I should have at the end of the straight. But it's the way it is. Sometimes you do mistakes and I'll learn from it.

Q: It was still a perfect job, Charles. Congratulations. And on to the next one. Thank you. Congratulations, Oscar. Fantastic race. I always have to think that it's only your second season. Very mature race. Tell me a little bit more about it. How did you overtake Charles? How did you control the race? You did it all yourself. There was no luck involved. You did a fantastic job. Explain it to us, please.
Oscar Piastri: Yeah, I mean, I tried at the start of the race to get in front, but once I dropped out of DRS, I just didn't have the pace, and after the stop, I saw we were pretty close again, and I felt like we had a little bit of extra grip, and I had to go for it because I knew that if I didn't get past, I was, didn't get past the start of the stint, I was never going to get past, so I went for a pretty big lunge, but managed to pull it off, and then hung on for dear life for the next 35 laps. So yeah, the last couple of laps, once he dropped out of DRS, were a little bit more relaxing, but there's no such thing as a relaxing lap around here. So it was hard work, but no, I think that definitely goes down as one of my better races of my career.

Q: It was a very good race, Oscar. And how does it feel to bring McLaren back in the lead of a world championship? It must be a great feeling being part of such a team, you know, long time not in this position. How do you feel? You're very young. And for you, tell us the feeling?
OP: Yeah, I think considering where we started when I joined the team last year, you know, we were literally last. And now we are leading the World Championship. So it's a full credit to the team for the turnaround we've managed to have in my 18 months here. Firstly, in terms of improving the car, but helping me improve as well. You know, results like this definitely weren't possible 12 months ago for myself. So it's a massive team effort. And yeah, excited to see what the future holds.

Press Conference

Q: Charles, if we come to you first, very well done. You drove beautifully. You spent a lot of time looking at the gearbox of Oscar Piastri's McLaren. What were the differences between your cars today?
CL: Thanks for reminding me! It's been a pretty frustrating race. We ran two different configurations. Obviously, they had, I think, a lower downforce package. We had a bit more downforce, which made us quite quick in the castle section. However, in all the straights they were flying. And that's probably where I lost the race. I misjudged that. And when Oscar overtook me into Turn 1, I was not too worried. I just wanted to stay within the DRS, keep my tyres, and attempt an overtake later on. However, this opportunity never really arose again, just because we were too slow in the straights. Yeah, that was a small misjudgement, which had a big consequence. So sometimes it hurts, and it does today. But it's the way it is. On the other hand, it's been a pretty good last couple of races in terms of performance. This weekend hasn't been great, because obviously we've got Carlos that was in a good position that didn't manage to finish the race. But within the team, we are in a good position in a good mood and we need to keep pushing in that direction.

Q: Thirty-one laps on the hard tyre was a lot, especially in dirty air the whole time, or pretty much the whole time. At what point did you start to struggle?
CL: Straight away. Straight away. As soon as I got out of the box on the Hard, we just didn't manage to find the grip that McLaren had on those tyres. And then again, when Oscar overtook me, I was quite calm in the car. And I just was focusing on my tyre management, which I did. And after 10, 15 laps, I thought that everything was coming together and that maybe towards the end, we will be in a better place. But with the dirty air, I think for 20, 25 laps towards the end, my tyres were completely gone. And again, they were just too quick in the straights for me to attempt anything.

Q: Can you talk us through Oscar's move for the lead? Did he catch you by surprise?
CL: Not really by surprise, because he wasn't completely straight behind me. He was a little bit on the left. So I could see in my mirrors that he was there and that it was a possibility for him to go there. But again, I couldn't really be super aggressive. I still had cold tyres. I was really struggling to put those tyres into temperature. I just thought it wasn't that much of a big deal if he would overtake me at that point of the race because the race was still long and the DRS would help me to stay within a second of him and then once my tyres will be in temperature I could overtake him again. But as I said, that was a misjudgement from my side.

Q: Now, you said there's a good mood in the team. This was your fourth podium in a row. Do you have a car now that you can compete for the win at every Grand Prix?
CL: Not yet. I think Baku, Monza and probably Singapore as well. These three races have very specific characteristics for cars. So we've got to wait maybe for Austin that will be a bit more of a normal track again to understand whether we've done the steps forward we expected. But in these last two races plus Singapore, we need to maximise the points and take opportunities if we have opportunity to actually win races. Today, I felt like we've missed that opportunity.

Q: OK, bad luck. Thank you, Charles, for that. George, let's come to you now. Very well done as well. Third time on the podium this year for you. After starting P5, what were your expectations coming into the Grand Prix?
GR: Yeah, we thought we could probably fight for P5. But how the race unfolded, we definitely didn't expect. We were really slow in the first stint. I was about one and a half seconds slower than Charles most laps. And it all felt pretty disastrous. But then the last 20 laps of the race, we were a second lap quicker than Piastri and Charles and three or four tenths quicker than Max and Carlos and Checo. So, you know, I'm sort of a bit frazzled as to why that is. The only difference is going from a yellow tyre to a white tyre. And, yeah, we need to understand why, understand further.

Q: Well, you were the only team to run the Hard tyre in practice on Friday. Did that prior knowledge help you?
GR: Not really, to be honest. In practice on Friday... The track's been really dirty this weekend, and the track was about three seconds off the pace on Friday, so I didn't contribute towards it.

Check out our Sunday gallery from Baku here.