Azerbaijan race analysis

The European Grand Prix wasn't the most spectacular race this season. The race was pretty straightforward, without major accidents or safety car periods. The Mercedes-powered cars enjoyed a significant advantage over their rivals, which enabled Rosberg to win the race easily, while Pérez took another well-deserved podium.

The teams without a Mercedes engine were struggling. The Renault factory team was even outpaced by the Mercedes-powered Manors in qualifying. The similarly disadvantaged Red Bull team did remarkably well in qualifying, but they were not nearly as good in the race. Just as in Canada their low-downforce setup caused them to eat their tires in the race; especially the softer compounds. They were, however, not the only ones.

In the race there were two groups of teams: the teams with tire problems and teams without. Unfortunately for the race, the top teams apparently had very little tire degradation, in contrast to the other teams. Apart from Mercedes, Ferrari and Force India only Bottas, Magnussen and Haryanto managed to finish the race on just one stop. Red Bull and McLaren were really struggling on the supersofts. Based on a laptime analysis with team-dependent tire wear, their degradation was over a second per lap, This explains why they pitted after just a handful of laps. While the McLarens were much happier on the softs, the Red Bulls only seemed to work on the mediums:

Tire wear on the supersofts with respect to tire wear on softs per team (red dots).

The supersoft tires were discarded early in the race, which makes those tires harder to analyze. Congestion and track evolution always decrease the accuracy of the laptime predictions of the first laps. To my surprise the analysis shows that the yellow soft tire was the tire with highest degradation and generally highest outright pace. This may be due to drivers nursing their supersofts to stretch their first stint, but as the leaders were really pushing to build a gap, that seems unlikely. On average, tire degradation on the softs was about 0.07 seconds per lap. The supersofts were slightly more durable with a tire degradation of 0.04 seconds per lap, while the mediums were, as expected, most durable with a tire degradation of only 0.03 seconds per lap.

Azerbaijan race - Driver by driver

Rosberg (1) was flying on supersofts (+0.6). His second stint was a bit inconsistent due to traffic, a wrong engine setting and no pressure from behind. Therefore, he was 0.4s slower than the fastest man on softs, which turned out to be Räikkönen.
Vettel (2) was slightly faster than Rosberg on softs (+0.3), but much slower on supersofts (+1.7). Due to the relatively high tire wear on the soft tires his decision to delay his pitstop was probably the right thing to do.
Pérez (3) was just incredibly fast on softs (+0.2s), but considerably slower on supersofts (+2.1s).
Räikkönen (4) was estimated to be the fastest driver on the race. On softs. On supersofts he was a massive 2.6 seconds slower, although this figure is not very reliable as he pitted early. Perhaps that early stop really cost him later in the race.

Hamilton (5) showed his true pace in a only few laps in the race, as he was in traffic on supersofts (+1.9) and in the wrong engine mode for most of his stint on softs (+0.9). In the last laps he wasn't even pushing as he felt he was too far behind. A horrible race.

Bottas (6) was still slightly slower than that at +2.2 on supersofts and +1.2 on softs. He had the highest top speeds of all, but unlike the Red Bulls his tire wear was pretty good. The pace just wasn't there, so possibly he had to drive very carefully to keep the tires alive.

Ricciardo (7) saw his supersofts drop off after just 3 laps, which resulted in a disappointing pace (+2.8). On the softs he wasn't too bad (+1.5), but still he had to switch to the mediums (+1.6).
Verstappen (8) was really struggling on the supersofts (+4.4). He was a little better on the softs (+1.8), but he really came alive on the mediums (+1.3).
Hülkenberg (9) was on the counter strategy, but it didn't really work out very well. His pace on softs wasn't particularly good (+2.1) and he was faster on supersofts (+1.7) until those tires hit the cliff.

Massa (10) had to convert to a 2-stopper, unlike his teammate. His tires gave up in the last stint and therefore he was unable to attack. On the soft tire his pace wasn't great (+1.7) and on the supersofts he was just slow (+3.1).
Button (11) was very slow on the supersofts (+3.9), but much better on the softs (+1.8).
Nasr (12) finally had a good race. His pace was a bit disappointing on the supersofts (+3.8). but he was much faster on softs (+1.9).

Grosjean (13) was one of the few drivers who used all three available tire compounds. He was quite fast on the softs (+1.6), alright on the mediums (+2.5), but quite bad on the supersofts (+3.2).

Magnussen (14) did a very long stint to recover from his pitlane start. He was at +1.9 on softs and +3.6 in his very short stint on supersofts.

Palmer (15) was also at +2.0 on softs and quite fast on supersofts (+2.7). Still he ended up behind his teammate.

Gutiérrez (16) was remarkably fast on the supersofts (+2.8) and alright on the softs (+1.8).
Ericsson (17) was too slow on softs (+2.8) and a bit better on supersofts +2.6 in his short middle stint.
Haryanto (18) pitted at the end of the first lap and managed to finish the race without stopping again. His tire wear wasn't that impressive, however. His pace on the softs was +3.2.

Sainz (retired) was fast on the supersofts (+2.2) and alright on softs (+1.6). Should have been fast enough for points.

Alonso (retired) was a bit better than Button on the supersofts (+3.0), but slower on the softs (+2.1). Was about to lose his position before the car broke down.

Wehrlein (retired) wasn't particularly fast in the race. +2.5 on the softs and +4.6 on the mediums as he started to experience brake problems.