Did Baku chaos flatter Red Bull in practice?

Red Bull fastest on one of the most demanding engine tracks on the calendar, Lance Stroll in the top six, Lewis Hamilton down in 10th, the four fastest cars separated by little more than a tenth of a second, drivers going off the track left, right and centre, struggles with the tyres, brakes and to put any kind of meaningful laps together without making mistakes. This was Formula 1 practice at its most chaotic.

The reasons for such unpredictability are complex. Azerbaijan's Baku city circuit is an unusual street track, combining the straightline speed demands of Monza, the aerodynamic efficiency requirements of Spa, the asphalt smoothness and corner profiling of Sochi, but claustrophobic run-off areas and walls with all the forgiveness of Monaco at its most menacing.

"It's a weird track," says Red Bull's Daniel Ricciardo. "You pretty much run low downforce to not get eaten alive on the straight, but all the corners are second or third gear. It's kind of a high downforce track with a low downforce set-up. I think, if anything, that shouldn't hinder us. We'll see how we go."

As it turned out Red Bull went extremely well on Friday in Baku, going one-two in first practice and Max Verstappen topping both sessions before stuffing his RB13 into the wall at Turn 1 in the final minute of practice two - just to add to the chaotic impression.

PURE PACE RANKING

1. Red Bull (Verstappen) 1m43.362s (super-soft)
2. Mercedes (Bottas) 1m43.462s (super-soft)
3. Ferrari (Raikkonen) 1m43.489s (super-soft)
4. Williams (Stroll) 1m44.113s (super-soft)
5. Force India (Perez) 1m44.306s (soft)
6. Toro Rosso (Kvyat) 1m44.321s (super-soft)
7. McLaren (Alonso) 1m45.515s (super-soft)
8. Haas (Magnussen) 1m45.831s (super-soft)
9. Renault (Hulkenberg) 1m46.003s (soft)
10. Sauber (Wehrlein) 1m47.150s (super-soft)

"The whole day has been really positive, apart from the last lap," said Verstappen. "From lap one I felt really good in the car, even though in the short runs I could not take the maximum out of it because of traffic and yellow flags, so we can be quite happy with this.

"From the simulator to here the balance was working really well, so the preparation we did at the factory was very good and the car was working straight away on the track, so the correlation is good, and I think also from the engine side we had a little bit of an update so that is always positive."

Nevertheless, it was unusual to see Red Bull be so competitive - ahead of both Mercedes and Ferrari, which have been dominant so far in 2017. But Baku places some unusual demands on the teams and drivers, demands that are amplified on the first day of running, when the track surface is slippery and has yet to rubber in.

You have to balance engine power with ERS efficiency, drag at high speed, downforce at low-speed, working tyres that Pirelli freely admits are too hard for this track properly on a low-energy circuit, which also makes braking extremely challenging at a venue where there is a lot of demand on the brakes.

We saw all these challenges manifest during Friday practice in Baku and Red Bull clearly achieved the best compromise over one lap. Team boss Christian Horner described it as Red Bull's best Friday of the year, praising his drivers' ability to hang onto the car through the tight corners in low-downforce trim - impressive to watch from trackside - and saying the team had made strong progress with the set-up and development of the RB13 since introducing its Barcelona upgrade package in May.

The downforce efficiency level of the circuit is the highest apart from Spa and Monza, and Red Bull is usually very good at generating efficient downforce. Ricciardo also reckons the RB13 is particularly strong on the brakes, which helps at a venue where so many drivers struggled to get their cars stopped through braking zones at the end of long straights that cool the front tyres down excessively, leading to lots of lock-ups and mistakes.

The aerodynamic philosophy of Red Bull, Force India, McLaren and Ferrari - deliberately running higher rake than Mercedes and others - is principally about generating downforce at lower speeds, from the floor rather than the rear wing, so that will be helping on this track layout too.

As will a small update from engine supplier Renault, estimated to be worth two tenths of a second according Renault F1 boss Cyril Abiteboul. Autosport understands Renault tweaked the mapping and software of the power unit to improve driveability, which is very useful for exiting all those low-speed corners quickly. Red Bull and Toro Rosso have also changed their gear ratios for this race, which may be helping them make better use still of the updated Renault motor.

Red Bull also did a better job than most at getting the Pirelli tyres working on Friday, which others badly struggled with and which led to a lot of incidents. Several drivers crashed or locked up under braking and headed into the escape roads - including star man Verstappen, which highlights how difficult it was.

The persistent yellow flags disrupted rhythm for everyone and meant many drivers failed to set representative lap times on the super-soft tyre.

"It was a difficult day," said Renault's Nico Hulkenberg. "You saw this generation of cars are quite tough to drive here. On the limit, there's very little margin. It's too tight and too quick. This is quite a brutal track. It's dynamic, there's bumps there, front and rear locking, and we're just pushing on the limit. Permanent racetracks usually there is asphalt run-off, but in a track like this there is no room for error.

"I didn't really get a lap on super-soft - there were yellow flags, a red flag and we lost tyre temperature. Where I stand now is not realistic."

Stroll was one of the 'lucky' few, which is why he ended up so far up the timesheet where the likes of team-mate Felipe Massa, Force India's Sergio Perez and Mercedes' Hamilton, who would ordinarily have been ahead, ended up further down than expected.

Having to back off for these incidents cools the tyres further in what is already a critical scenario given the track layout and tyre compounds, which makes lap time harder to come by and can lead to further incidents.

"Right now we're fighting, the car is sometimes good, sometimes not good," said Hamilton. "We're trying to figure out how we can make the car be where it needs to be. I didn't get my lap at the end, I got some traffic, then went wide at Turn 15, so I would've been in the top three time-wise [without that], but that's still a real struggle.

"I think everyone was struggling, everyone was locking, going wide, it's like 20% more [offs] than it was last year. The grip is very bad. I think everyone is struggling to get the tyres working - the Red Bulls and the Ferraris perhaps less than some others, but everyone is struggling generally in the whole pitlane.

"These tyres are just so hard, they're too hard. You can't come to this incredibly warm place and have the track at 50 degrees and these tyres still don't work, it doesn't make sense."

Last season Red Bull was quick over one lap, but chewed the tyres to bits over the long runs. This year the team appears to have found a better balance, although arguably it is Ferrari that looks in the best shape in this regard.

LONG RUN RANKING (super-soft)

1. Ferrari (Vettel) 1m46.544s (9 laps)
2. Red Bull (Verstappen) 1m46.745s (6 laps)
3. Mercedes (Bottas) 1m46.938s (6 laps)
4. Williams (Massa) 1m47.236s (11 laps)
5. Toro Rosso (Sainz) 1m47.775s (5 laps)
6. Force India (Perez) 1m47.975s (5 laps)
7. Renault (Hulkenberg) 1m48.178s (9 laps)
8. Haas (Magnussen) 1m48.616s (8 laps)
9. McLaren (Vandoorne) 1m49.522s (6 laps)
10. Sauber (Wehrlein) 1m51.606s (5 laps)

LONG RUN RANKING (soft)
1. Ferrari (Raikkonen) 1m46.953s (8 laps)
2. Force India (Perez) 1m47.314s (7 laps)
3. Red Bull (Verstappen) 1m47.900s (4 laps)
4. Mercedes (Hamilton) 1m48.106s (4 laps)

Many teams failed to do anything representative on the soft compound, but of those that did we got a glimpse of the sort of impressive form Force India showed on this track last season.

Ferrari looks in decent shape, but Mercedes appears to be struggling on the sort of billiard-smooth track surface and circuit configuration that made its life so hard at Sochi. This is despite enjoying the benefit of F1's most powerful and efficient engine and not having to worry about the troublesome ultra-soft tyre.

"We struggled quite a bit with tyre temperatures, especially the front end," explained Valtteri Bottas. "Then it is so easy to have a bit of a lock-up under braking and go wide in the corner. The tyre compounds feel a bit harder, that makes it less grippy - and the cars are more difficult to drive and more difficult when you're pushing to the limit to get the most out of it.

"From my side, I want to get the car balance better, more drivable. For me, it's quite oversteery still. The balance is not so consistent through the corner. There is understeer, oversteer - especially going over the kerbs.

"Red Bull definitely seem strong, they seem to have a well-balanced car and could do a lot of consistent laps and long runs. Their car seems to be very stable here, very drivable, and if you have the trust in the car here there is a lot of lap time to be found."

Red Bull looked good on the super-soft in the heat of the daytime in Bahrain earlier this season, even when the car was proving more troublesome to set-up, so it does seems there is something about the combination of that tyre compound and high track temperatures that suits the RB13.

It looks to be right in the mix in a close three-way fight at the front at the moment, but it is not expecting to have enough from those new Renault engine modes to go toe-to-toe with Mercedes and Ferrari in Q3 on Saturday.

It may be able to race them on Sunday, as Verstappen did briefly in Canada last time out, but to beat them in qualifying will require underperformance from the red and silver cars.

Red Bull has undoubtedly improved dramatically over recent races and it would be great if the multiple champion team could thrust its way properly into the battle at the front.

But as good as Red Bull was on Friday in Azerbaijan, it's likely going to take some more Baku chaos for that hope to become a reality when the running really matters.