Pole Position: Lando Norris
- Lando Norris
- Charles Leclerc
- Lewis Hamilton
Bold Prediction: Both Aston’s make Q3
Tag: Aston Martin
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- Max Verstappen-
This may be one of Max Verstappen’s greatest wins. In a weekend in which he did not have the fastest car, he made the difference, through a sublime qualifying lap and held on despite massive pressure from Norris towards the end of the race to take his 59th win.
2. Lando Norris-
Whilst slightly underperforming in qualifying, Lando made up for it with superb tyre management throughout the race. To only finish 0.7 seconds towards Verstappen, a sight we’ve barely seen during the last couple of years, shows that his win in Miami was not a one-off, but a sign of a McLaren resurgence.
3. Yuki Tsunoda-
Yuki continues to impress this year. Once again outqualifying Ricciardo, at times this weekend he looked like challenging the top teams. Whilst the overall race pace of the RB has yet to escape the midfield, Yuki still held on to score a valuable point at home. With every impressive performance, it is really starting to seem like he may actually get that Red Bull seat one day.
4. Lance Stroll-
Stroll had a quietly impressive performance this weekend. On a track that was difficult to overtake on and a weekend where his teammate was nowhere, Stroll improved from his starting position to drag his underperforming Aston Martin into the points. Whilst I’m not the biggest Lance Stroll fan, I have to give credit where it’s due.
5. Kevin Magnussen-
Kevin’s performance is going to go under looked this weekend. He was comprehensively outqualified by his teammate, yet was making move after move in a track that is difficult to overtake on, to recover to twelfth, only a few seconds behind the sister car. In a better car, he delivered a points worthy performance.
Tally:
- Max Verstappen- 5
- Lando Norris- 4
- Yuki Tsunoda- 4
- Carlos Sainz- 3
- Nico Hulkenberg- 2.5
- Kevin Magnussen- 2.5
- Sergio Perez- 2
- Charles Leclerc- 2
- Oscar Piastri- 2
- Esteban Ocon- 2
- Lance Stroll- 2
- George Russell- 1
- Fernando Alonso- 1
- Oliver Bearman- 1
- Zhou Guanyu- 1
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- Max Verstappen-
Max was dominant this weekend, easily having the pace over all the other cars. Surviving two safety car restarts with no trouble, Verstappen drove one of his classic, relaxing Sunday afternoon drives. The dominance of Red Bull this weekend was scary, these Ferrari upgrades cannot come soon enough.
2. Lando Norris-
Whilst bottling the chance to win the Saturday Sprint, Lando was the MVP this weekend. His pace in the wet qualifying was scarily good and ensured that Perez was out paced, out strategized, and out raced. The driver of the day award was well deserved.
3. Fernando Alonso-
Fernando had an amazing couple of qualifying sessions, ending up third. He then ran second throughout the early portion of the race. Whilst dropping down due to a car lacking race pace and bad strategy, Fernando recovered through the field with a series of varied and decisive overtakes, finishing seventh and taking the fastest lap to boot.
4. Nico Hulkenberg-
Hulkenberg continued his strong start to the season to secure yet another point for Haas. Nico qualified in the top ten and made no major errors to finish in the best possible position for his car. Haas have been the big surprise of the season and are beginning to look like rockstars.
5. Esteban Ocon-
Ocon has performed well during the season, dragging that tractor into positions it has no right being in. This week, that position was eleventh, just outside of the points. Whilst seldom on screen, I noticed Ocon making moves on the timing screen. How he did so in that car is anyone’s guess, but it deserves a shout out.
Tally:
- Max Verstappen- 4
- Carlos Sainz- 3
- Nico Hulkenberg- 2.5
- Sergio Perez- 2
- Charles Leclerc- 2
- Lando Norris- 2
- Yuki Tsunoda- 2
- Oscar Piastri- 1
- George Russell- 1
- Fernando Alonso- 1
- Lance Stroll- 1
- Oliver Bearman- 1
- Zhou Guanyu- 1
- Esteban Ocon- 1
- Kevin Magnussen- 0.5
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A decent race in Shanghai this weekend was buoyed by the stellar commentary of Nico Rosberg. He has the perspective of someone who deeply understands the sport, able to analyse moment-to-moment actions quickly and reasonably, alongside possessing a balanced perspective on the long-term picture of the race. He is not afraid to call out Crofty when he makes flawed observations, which afforded me the usual activity of shouting at my TV whenever I disagree with him. To accredit David Croft, he can be great at delivering hype during exciting battles, but it helps to have a more analytical voice to balance the coverage out.
Regardless of Nico Rosberg’s commentary, I enjoy this track. There are a variety of corners, all wide enough to allow for possible overtakes. This allows for drivers to attempt different lines and find unique opportunities to make those vital moves fans enjoy. The crowd also delivered, the hype for Zhou Guanyu, F1’s first Chinese driver, rivalling the support from Japanese or Dutch fans. Seeing Zhou crying at the end after finally racing at home was an incredibly wholesome moment. Whilst Zhou has not been an outstanding driver, a country that possesses over a billion people and one of the most important markets in the world needs a star to cheer.
Two weeks ago, McLaren were ruing their disappointment in Japan. But this week, their disappointment dissipated, as they unexpectedly proved the second fastest team. Whilst not having the pace to challenge Verstappen, Lando Norris maximized his pace to finish in second, a fantastic result for the team. Post-race, Lando was hopeful of achieving his long-awaited win this year and if McLaren can develop their car well, his first win seems inevitable and deserving for a driver of evident talent.
Two other topics that warrant mentioning are the arbiters of entertainment, Ferrari and Fernando. Whilst both suffered a regretful weekend, Ferrari lacking pace and Aston Martin strategy, the best overtakes all seemed to be those committed by Fernando and Charles. Fernando instantly ended Sergio Perez’s chance of winning the race by overtaking him at the start and the Ferrari’s picked their way through the slower cars. Charles humbled his on-form teammate, whilst in the meantime Alonso’s teammate humbled himself. The second half of the race proved weak for both drivers, Leclerc slowly realizing that he hadn’t been given the pace to fight Norris and Aston foolishly pitting Alonso onto soft tyres, then requiring another pit stop to finish the race. But both drivers used their talent to maximize the situations, Leclerc finishing just off of the podium and Alonso making decisive moves in his final stint to wrap up a healthy haul of points.
In conclusion, we had a decent weekend of F1 with good commentary, a solid track and a surprising second place. It’s good to have Shanghai back on the Formula One calendar, though hopefully next year we have a fight for the win.
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This weekend, we were witness to one of the best stories F1 has provided in a long time. Carlos Sainz, who only two weeks ago was recovering from appendicitis, won the race. Furthermore, Max Verstappen retired. Whilst most F1 fans would never wish bad luck on any driver, F1 needed a Verstappen retirement, if merely for reminding casual fans that it is possible for other people to win an F1 race. It’s not often I agree with Crofty, but when he declared that this was a result F1 needed, I completely concurred. A smile was on my face seeing a Ferrari 1-2.
All this almost distracted from the fact that I found the race boring.
Yes, even without Max Verstappen, a processional race with limited overtaking still occurred. In terms of track action, it appeared to have the least of the three races so far, the only racing highlights being Magnussen and Tsunoda making switchback moves at turn ten. This is because F1 has outgrown the Melbourne circuit. Narrow cars that can navigate the tight circuit of Melbourne have been replaced with wide cars that struggle to overtake here, which is a shame as the circuit provides one of the best vibes on the calendar.
Yet still, Sainz winning almost made this race appear to be a classic.
With little on track action throughout the middle of the race, attention was drawn to Sauber’s pit stops. Sauber appears to have decided to honor their gambling sponsorship by making the odds of a successful pit stop roughly the same as the odds of big winnings on a slot machine. The official reason behind their 30-50 second pit stops is that they have bought new wheel gun equipment for the year. Unfortunately, these wheel guns do not work properly with their car. If any other team did this they would become the laughing stock of F1, for failing on something so basic to success. However, as Sauber is already the most anonymous and mediocre, their pit stops just become another problem they have to solve. Still, the team should be embarrassed, especially when looking at statistics showing that they have already spent more time doing pit stops in three races than nine drivers did for the whole of last year.[1]
After a long race with little action, the most controversial moment suddenly happened on the last lap. George Russell crashed and this was partially caused by Alonso slowing down for turn six early, in order to get a better exit, likely to defend from Russell at the overtaking zone. Alonso’s actions, despite no contact with Russell, earned him a 20-second penalty, demoting him from 6th to 8th. The steward’s defense was that this was due to Alonso lifting, braking and downshifting a hundred meters earlier than on every other lap, before beginning to accelerate again, as by his own admission, he made a mistake.[2] The stewards argued that as this was inconsistent with Alonso’s previous laps, that it constituted driving ‘unnecessarily slowly… in a manner that could be deemed potentially dangerous.’[3] The stewards also argued that they were not taking the consequences of the incident into account.[4] The last point is obviously false. Hulkenberg moved under braking to cut off Alex Albon earlier in the race ‘in a manner that could be deemed potentially dangerous.’ Yet as Albon reacted and avoided Hulkenberg, no penalty was handed out. Additionally, back in Saudi, Magnussen backed up the entire midfield pack for multiple laps. If drivers didn’t react to Magnussen driving ‘unnecessarily slowly’ then there could have been a concertina effect where multiple cars crashed into each other. Yet this did not happen. So, Magnussen was allowed, in that case, to drive ‘unnecessarily slowly’. Presumably as Magnussen was lifting a hundred meters earlier for many laps, rather than just one, this made it safe? If Alonso had made the exact same move, yet Russell had reacted to it and slowed down accordingly, there would have been no penalty. Alonso’s move may have contributed to Russell’s accident, yet to punish a driver for the impact of their dirty air, itself a problem exemplified by F1’s wide cars, seems inconsistent and unfair.
So, F1 provided us with bad racing, long pit stops and awful stewarding. Yet still, the novelty of Verstappen winning made up for that. I just hope the next time Verstappen doesn’t win, there’s actually a good race to analyse, rather than merely a good result.
[1] https://twitter.com/F1BigData/status/1771911908506865952
[2] https://twitter.com/fiadocsbot/status/1771822384309231731
[3] https://twitter.com/fiadocsbot/status/1771822384309231731 [Article 33.4]
[4] https://twitter.com/fiadocsbot/status/1771822384309231731
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With the first race just days away, now is a great time to predict the championship standings. I have deliberately avoided seeing anyone else’s predictions, so am relying on testing, reports and social media reports to come up with these predictions.
Constructors Championship:
10: Sauber
As well as having a really poor sponsorship I wrote an article about, Sauber didn’t inspire much hope during testing. I expect a tough couple of seasons before Audi takes over the team.
9: Haas
I am taking a risk by not putting Haas last. But despite the general pessimism from the team, I’m betting on both Haas and Sauber not scoring many points, so it should only take one good result to swing the standings. I would not be surprised to see a surprise finish from Hulkenberg that would prevent Haas from finishing last again.
8: Alpine
In F1 testing Alpine looked like they could be the slowest team. Reports hint that the car is overweight and lacks downforce. Yes, the team should develop throughout the year but I don’t suspect them to develop fast enough to escape the lower midfield.
7: Williams
Albon proved last year that he can deliver consistently and singlehandedly won Williams seventh last year. For Williams to secure this position though, Logan Sargeant needs to perform. Sargeant had a really poor season last year, only scoring one point to Albon’s twenty-seven. But, if the Williams is a more stable car, hopefully Sargeant can score some better results to be top of the lower midfield.
6: Visa Cash App RB
Whilst having a ridiculous name, the VCARB impressed at pre-season testing. I expect them to occupy the position Alpine did last year, not challenging the top teams, but removed from the cars behind them..
5: Aston Martin
Alonso’s long run pace was quite impressive at pre-season testing. Whilst few expect a repeat of last year, where Aston Martin launched as the second fastest car, I do believe that they’ll be competing with the other top teams for podiums. They may even develop into one of the fastest cars. However, I cannot in good conscience put them any higher than fifth, due to the presence of Lance Stroll. He had a pretty terrible season last year and I expect this form to continue. But, if Stroll can turn his performances around, Aston could challenge for the top three places.
4: McLaren
I published an article at the beginning of the year doubting McLaren’s ambitions to be a Red Bull challenger. I based this upon the fact that McLaren had a history of making overly ambitious targets before their car had tested. Their long run pace appears to have vindicated me, as they look quite a way behind Red Bull and Ferrari. Whilst the track characteristics of Bahrain would exaggerate the deficit, as the McLaren was best in high-speed tracks last year, I think it unlikely that McLaren will immediately be challenging for race wins. However, as they have proven over the last two years, the team has a knack for in season development. This will likely save their season and despite my doubts, I do hope to see some McLaren race wins this year.
3: Mercedes
I expect Mercedes to have a very track specific car, as they have for the last couple of years, but probably with higher highs than the last two years. I think Mercedes, McLaren and possibly Aston Martin will be locked in a season long battle for third. But I think Mercedes has the best driver line up and Lewis Hamilton and George Russell should both be able to get wins if the car allows it.
2: Ferrari
Ferrari’s long run pace at the pre-season testing looked impressive. They do not look that far off Red Bull. I still expect Red Bull to be champions yet am optimistic that Ferrari will get a number of race wins this year.
1: Red Bull
The RB20 looks intimidating. Max Verstappen did not look to have any degradation in his long run pace and the team may have even found the W13’s missing downforce. A combination of another dominant car and the best driver in F1 should deliver them a relatively easy constructors’ championship.
Drivers Championship:
- Max Verstappen
- Charles Leclerc
- Sergio Perez
- Lewis Hamilton
- Fernando Alonso
- Carlos Sainz
- Lando Norris
- George Russell
- Oscar Piastri
- Daniel Ricciardo
- Yuki Tsunoda
- Lance Stroll
- Alex Albon
- Esteban Ocon
- Pierre Gasly
- Logan Sargeant
- Nico Hulkenberg
- Valtteri Bottas
- Zhou Guanyu
- Kevin Magnussen
Bold Predictions:
- Lando Norris wins his first race, then gets disqualified after the race.
- Alex Albon gets a podium for Williams.
- Lewis Hamilton will win one of his last five races for Mercedes.
- At least one Grand Prix will be cancelled due to unforeseen circumstances.
- Charles Leclerc will get more pole positions than Max Verstappen.
Ryan's Lil' F1 Blog 