Tag: Race Report

2019 German GP report | Verstappen wins utterly chaotic race

Posted on by James Mackenzie
What a difference a year makes…
Max Verstappen wins the German Grand Prix.
Image credit: LAT Images

Max Verstappen came home to take a popular victory at the 2019 German Grand Prix after an incredibly eventful race which was dominated by ever-changing weather conditions. The race started under a safety car but, after it came in, we experienced the first post-safety-car standing start. And from there, the madness never really stopped.

Strap yourself in: this might be a long write-up.

Lewis Hamilton led away from pole but Verstappen, alongside him on the front row, suffered severely with wheelspin and dropped back behind Valtteri Bottas and the Alfa Romeo of Kimi Räikkönen. There was normally a car in a run-off area during the next few laps as the drivers struggled with cold tyres and a slippery track. Räikkönen held on to his impressive 3rd place for a couple of laps but was passed by Verstappen just before Sergio Pérez became the first casualty of the race, spinning his very jittery Racing Point and being collected by the wall. That brought out the first safety car of the day and the first wave of pit stop panic. Most cars came in for intermediate tyres and, in the pandemonium, Ferrari were punished with a fine for an unsafe release having sent Charles Leclerc out directly into Romain Grosjean’s path.

The rain stopped and the track began to dry up, but teams suspected more was on the way and were instructing their drivers to try and take care of their tyres. Daniel Ricciardo experienced an all-too-familiar Renault engine blow-up on Lap 15 and Leclerc used the ensuing Virtual Safety Car for a cheap pit stop. Suddenly he was the fastest car on track by two seconds a lap and rapidly closing in on the front three. A bit more rain had begun to fall but Kevin Magnussen and then Sebastian Vettel – who had started the race from the back of the grid – took the gamble of pitting for dry tyres; after initially sliding around, they began to set fastest sectors and those in front decided to follow suit.

Red Bull fitted the mediums to Verstappen, which take longer to heat up than the soft tyres. The Dutchman span – but survived with a neat 360 – and berrated his team over the radio for not giving him the softs. Another Renault engine blow-up – this time for the luckless Lando Norris – brought out another VSC on Lap 28. The race was about to turn on its head.

Leclerc benefitted again, pitting for soft tyres and leapfrogging Bottas for 2nd place. Hamilton, who had been controlling the race superbly from the front up to this point, then also pitted for softs. This top two would not last long however as Leclerc ran wide on to the slippery drag strip on the outside of the final corner and aquaplaned into the barriers and out of the race. Moments later, with a safety car already called, Hamilton suffered a near carbon copy of the incident but just about managed to keep the car moving, having bounced off the barriers. He had lost his front wing though and would need to pit.

Image credit: AFP

This meant, firstly, he had to go the wrong side of the bollard at pit entry – which would earn him a five second penalty – and, secondly, that his engineers were not ready. Thus ensued a fairly comedic 50-second pit stop with engineers bumping into each other as they tried to replace the nose and changed their mind on which tyres to fit. Hamilton did eventually re-join in 5th; some blushes spared by the gap he had held and the safety car. In the meantime, most had now changed back to inters and the new top 5 was Verstappen, Nico Hülkenberg, Bottas, Alexander Albon, Hamilton.

The Mercedes cars worked their way back into the top 3 within a few laps and then, with that elusive podium in sight, agonisingly, Hülkenberg recreated the Leclerc/Hamilton incidents but with the Leclerc result of bogging down in the gravel and retiring. This brought out yet another safety car. Verstappen and Vettel pitted but the Mercedes did not. Just three laps after the restart, all the drivers came in for dry tyres and Racing Point’s gamble to fit them to Lance Stroll’s car during the safety car period meant that he was suddenly, unbelievably leading the race.

It didn’t take long for Verstappen to retake the lead of the race but we were left with a provisional podium of Verstappen, Stroll and the Toro Rosso of Daniil Kvyat. Then another uncharacteristic error from Hamilton saw him spin at turn 1 on Lap 54, whilst chasing down. The championship-leader narrowly kept it out of the barriers but was forced to pit for new tyres and rejoined in last place. And then, just when Mercedes thought things couldn’t get any worse, Bottas – whilst chasing Stroll for 3rd – recreated Hamilton’s spin from a couple of laps prior but couldn’t keep it out of the barriers. He hit the wall, about as hard as Toto Wolff’s hand hit his desk, and was out of the race too. The safety car made its fifth appearance.

It returned to the pits on Lap 59, leaving a five-lap sprint race to the end. The race still had time for one more retirement as Pierre Gasly drove into the back of Albon whilst battling for 6th; a poorly-timed mistake from the under-fire Frenchman, with excellent performances from both the Toro Rosso drivers that are eyeing up his seat. Verstappen finished the job and sealed an almost flawless victory – his second of the season. Meanwhile Vettel, who had been steadily working his way through the field at various points of the race, sent the home fans wild by passing Stroll and then Kvyat for an unlikely 2nd place.

Behind Verstappen and Vettel, Kvyat took the final place on the podium – Toro Rosso’s second ever podium. Stroll held on to 4th, Sainz – who had at one point spun out and had to put it in reverse – claimed 5th, and Albon 6th. After the race, the two Alfa Romeos – who had finished 7th and 8th on the road – were given 30 second time penalties for driver aid infringements. This promoted the Haas drivers of Romain Grosjean and Kevin Magnussen, who had conspired to crash into each other once again during the final laps, along with Hamilton to 9th and Robert Kubica to 10th. In a season where he has perenially been running in last place, the least likely of points scorers to cap the least likely of races.

And breathe.

Redemption in Red

Image credit: Ferrari

A year on from his title-swinging, gut-wrenching crash in the rain at Hockenheim, Sebastian Vettel produced an inspired fight through the field to finish 2nd, having started the race at the very back of the grid.

It was not only a tale of the difference a year can make for Vettel, but also the difference 24 hours can make. For the second time in three races, he experienced a technical issue in qualifying as his Ferrari developed a turbo problem and he was unable to set a competitive time. Last place on the grid with rain forecast for Sunday always felt like a chance for redemption and that’s exactly how it played out.

Vettel, who was born just half an hour’s drive down the road from Hockenheim, got straight down to business. He was up to 10th by Lap 5; 7th by Lap 8. For the most part of the race he was then generally running in the low end of the top 10 – changing surprisingly little despite the madness going on around him. But he came alive towards the end of the race, using the straight line speed of the Ferrari and some tactical nous to pass cars before and after the final safety car period and collecting a well-deserved 2nd place.

It is a much-needed result for himself and his team. And particularly fitting that it occurred on the effective anniversary of his lowest point, in Germany last year. For a team that has been much-criticised for their strategic calls in recent years, Ferrari barely put a foot wrong in such a manic race and made up numerous positions for both cars with opportunistic pit stops.

Will this prove to be a turning point for team and driver? Time will tell. But it’s certainly a step in the right direction.

A Miserable Anniversary for Mercedes

For a team that had won nine of the first 10 races this season, one would imagine that this was just another weekend. But no, this one really mattered to the dominant force of recent F1 history that is Mercedes-Benz: it was one of their two home Grands Prix; they were celebrating (complete with special livery and fancy dress) the 125th anniversary of motorsport and their 200th Grand Prix; this was the one race they had given access to the Netflix crew of Drive to Survive. So for things to have gone this way will have especially hurt them.

In fairness, there were few truly major errors; it was mostly a domino effect from a few small ones. They dominated the first half of the race. Particularly so Hamilton, despite still suffering from illness, but that ended with the first switch to dry tyres. In hindsight, it was a bad call. Hamilton had a very comfortable lead and was saying that he didn’t think the switch was the right call – it was still raining after all. Could they have waited for a lap or two to see how things were progressing? Yes, but of course that is easy to say now. Either way, the call was made, Hamilton ran wide and then brought about an embarrassing pit stop as he was forced to pit immediately whilst the team had been waiting for Bottas with different tyres. The whole episode made the fancy dress element of their celebrations seem suddenly very clownish.

A few laps later, they were back running 2nd and 3rd but this is where the wheels were really about to fall off – literally in the case of Bottas. Again, in hindsight, they probably should have pitted Hamilton under the safety car and were overly wary of the five-second time penalty dropping him too far back when the drying track was about to make that issue far worse. But the drivers were about to outdo the strategists in terms of their mistakes with synchronised spins at Turn 1.

Hamilton rescued his but Bottas did not and his was far more costly. Hamilton does not present his competitors with an opportunity to claw back that many points in the title race very often. And for it to happen just as the Mercedes hierarchy is about to decide on their driver line-up for 2020 and beyond is particularly unfortunate. You have to wonder if Bottas will mentally recover from this setback.

It seemed Toto Wolff had decided after the race that they would not be making such a song and dance about any celebration in the future: “It shows that you shouldn’t fool around with stuff – you should concentrate on the job, we are not superstitious, but we should focus on the job at hand.”

The German Grand Prix in 90 Seconds (It needed the Extra 30)

Answering the Burning Questions

Will the run of great races continue? Oh yeah. And then some.

Can Bottas can do anything to claw back some of Hamilton’s championship lead? He had the opportunity but fluffed his lines.

Will Leclerc and Verstappen have another epic battle? Not this time. Verstappen battled with Bottas, Leclerc battled with the slippery drag strip.

Can Gasly continue the progress he made at Silverstone? No. He crashed badly during practice and drove into the back of the sister car of Albon.

There are a few updates this weekend. Whose will have the biggest impact? Hard to tell in the rain but judging by earlier in the weekend, Racing Point seemed to have made a big jump.

Could we actually have a wet race?? We could and did. And it was great.

2019 British GP report | Hamilton wins for record sixth time

Posted on by James Mackenzie
History for Hamilton, fun for the fans.
Image credit: Getty Images

With some help from a fortunately timed safety car, Lewis Hamilton took a record-breaking victory at the 2019 British Grand Prix.

Having been pipped to pole position by his teammate Valtteri Bottas on Saturday, Hamilton came out of the blocks quickly and looked thoroughly determined to make amends. After a few laps getting increasingly close to the Finn’s gearbox, Hamilton made his move with a clever cut-back through Brooklands and looked to have the job done. But Bottas had other ideas. With the passionate home crowd still roaring, he pulled back alongside Hamilton and regained the lead into Copse Corner.

That was to prove the championship-leader’s best opportunity as he spent the rest of the first stint generally between 0.5 and 0.8 seconds behind. But when Bottas pitted on lap 16, Hamilton and his team saw an opportunity to mix up their strategy. He stayed out as long as he could, knowing that Bottas would need to stop again, with the aim of a one-stop race and the hope for a safety car. The latter duly obliged. By that point however, Hamilton had already put himself into a commanding position.

Even without a safety car, he was about to pit and rejoin a couple of seconds behind his teammate. Hamilton could then have sat behind Bottas, waiting for him to pit again and he showed just how much extra pace he had when he set the fastest lap on the last lap of the race, despite being on 30-lap-old hard tyres.

Bottas was actually fortunate to retain his 2nd place as those behind him had also pitted under the safety car and he was the only driver in the top six that needed to pit again. As it was, some antics from those following made his job far easier.

The Action Behind the Mercedes

Charles Leclerc and Max Verstappen picked up where they left off in Austria and this time the young Ferrari driver was going to make sure he gave as good as he got. He defended magnificently – at times towards the boundaries of acceptability, but always within them – lap after lap, in a battle that will likely be remembered for a long time to come and continues what is shaping into a fantastic rivalry. However, for all his excellent work, the Red Bull team produced a quicker pit stop which edged Verstappen out in front. Leclerc was not done though and immediately seized on a mistake by the Dutchman to regain his position. They then continued their fight until the safety car, where a delayed stop for Lelerc left him down in 6th.

Sebastian Vettel benefitted the most from the safety car and found himself up in 3rd on a weekend where he had been consistently off the pace. Verstappen, having been let past his team mate Pierre Gasly, began to close the gap on Vettel and on Lap 37 he made a move around the outside of Stowe. He was ahead but had ran slightly wide which allowed the German to close back up as they approached the chicane at the end of Vale. Vettel aimed for a small gap that was barely there and, once Verstappen had fully closed it off, was over-committed and had nowhere to go but into the back of the Red Bull. In desperation, he locked up and slammed into Verstappen’s gearbox, sending him flying sideways over the chicane.

Sebastian Vettel and Max Verstappen collide at the British Grand Prix.
Image credit: Formula 1

Verstappen impressively kept the car moving through the gravel and would recover to 5th, whilst Vettel had damaged his Ferrari more significantly and, once a ten-second penalty had been added on, would finish dead last.

It is another high profile mistake from the four-time world champion and will increase the pressure on him even further as we approach the German Grand Prix – the scene of his infamous crash last year that caused a swing in the championship he would never recover from and marked the beginning of this series of mistakes that has now run the length of an entire season. His young teammate has seemingly rectified his qualifying issues – having said he had changed his approach after the Canadian Grand Prix – and is now looking thoroughly the stronger Ferrari driver. Indeed, despite the issues with strategy and slow pit stops that were out of his control, he recovered to finish 3rd after the drama had unfolded ahead of him, and described it as “the race I enjoyed most in my F1 career”.

More Drama Throughout the Field

The action was not limited to the front six cars. Lando Norris continued his excellent form to run as best of the rest early on in the race, having passed the Renault of Daniel Ricciardo and then held him off impressively. However, it was his teammate, Carlos Sainz, who was the biggest benefactor of the safety car in the midfield, with it promoting him to 7th place, having started 13th. The Spaniard then did well to hold off an eager-to-divebomb Ricciardo for the final few laps and inherited 6th after the Vettel-Verstappen incident. The safety car sadly had the opposite affect on Norris who was left in the same situation as Bottas – but without a Mercedes to recover the lost time of a second stop – and ended 11th.

Haas had another weekend to forget. Amid ongoing dramas with their joke of a title sponsor, Rich Energy – seriously, they formulate tweets that read like a Donald Trump parody account – their two drivers crashed into each other on the first lap and were then soon forced to retire. What looked a promising season, when they qualified in 6th and 7th at the season-opener, has turned into a nightmare. They are now on average the second slowest car, particularly on Sundays as they continue to struggle with the tyres, and Romain Grosjean is surely wearing his team’s patience paper-thin with his current run of errors – even managing to spin into the wall at the pit exit during Practice 1.

A Few Extra Shout-Outs

The sheer amount of action in the race has left little room for much more analysis, so just a few quick words for those who deserve them.

Pierre Gasly had a long-overdue but nonetheless much-improved weekend. With the aim of helping him find some form, the Red Bull bosses decided he would be given Verstappen’s setup, with just the ability to tweak a few aspects to his liking. It seems to have worked wonders as he was the faster Red Bull through the practice sessions, came much closer to matching his teammate in qualifying and then finished a season-best 4th, having been in amongst the action of the top 6 throughout the race. He now needs to keep this up to reduce the rumours around his seat as silly season heats up.

Image credit: Red Bull Racing

Daniil Kvyat, having been somewhat put in his place on Saturday by teammate Alexander Albon, slowly but surely made his way up from 17th on the grid to finish an impressive 8th. Albon though was unfortunate on Sunday and further enhanced his reputation through the weekend on a track where he took the victory in F2 last year.

Speaking of last year’s F2, the 2018 champion, George Russell, continued his clean sweep over Robert Kubica on Saturday and then converted that to a best-ever finishing position of 14th in the race. Williams are slowly closing the gap on the midfield and it is Russell who is generally passing any cars that drop near him.

Although Hamilton’s 26 points were the only ones gained by British drivers at the British Grand Prix, Norris, Russell and Albon are all showing that British motorsport – or Thai-British motorsport in Albon’s case – has a very bright future.

Answering the Burning Questions

Can Red Bull and/or Ferrari take momentum from their performance in Austria and challenge Mercedes again? Ferrari looked closer earlier on but come race day it was Red Bull who may have challenged, had Verstappen been able to pass Leclerc. Mercedes were most likely in a class of one again though.

Will there be another controversial stewarding decision to make? The Vettel penalty was pretty much a slam dunk and the fact nothing between Leclerc and Verstappen was even investigated is pleasingly consistent.

Will McLaren continue to cement their place at the front of the midfield? Yes. Norris was unfortunate whilst Sainz was fortunate. Renault were certainly closer but it’s McLaren who came out with the most points.

Is Gasly capable of a decent result that would alleviate at least some pressure? Yes!

Can Hamilton make amends for last year’s British GP disappointment and send the home crowd wild? And if so, will he crowdsurf again? Yes and yes.

The British Grand Prix in 60 Seconds

2019 Austrian GP report | Verstappen takes dramatic victory

Posted on by James Mackenzie
An end to the Mercedes domination…and what a way to end it.
Max Verstappen wins the 2019 Austrian Grand Prix.
Image credit: Getty Images

Many criticised the sport in the wake of an uneventful race in France but, just seven days later, Formula 1 reminded the world of the drama it can produce with an action-packed 2019 Austrian Grand Prix, a last-gasp pass for the win and obviously some controversy to boot.

The youngest ever front row promised excitement into the first corner but, after Max Verstappen got away horribly, Charles Leclerc was left unchallenged and all the drama unfolded behind him with Lando Norris even momentarily passing Lewis Hamilton for 3rd. The following laps produced some good racing as Hamilton, Verstappen and Sebastian Vettel worked their way past the slower cars, before the usual top five started to break away from the pack and the race somewhat settled down.

Leclerc appeared comfortable at the front but was forced to pit slightly early to cover off Bottas – something that would prove decisive later on. Hamilton and Verstappen aimed to go long in their first stint but the Briton put paid to his chances by clipping one of the many unforgiving kerbs around the Spielberg track and damaging his front wing. The younger man in the Red Bull made no such mistake however and re-emerged in 4th with tyres 10 laps fresher than those ahead of him.

Verstappen then set about chasing Vettel, passing him with about 20 laps remaining and suddenly the masses of orange in the crowd realised there was the chance of an unlikely victory. Bottas proved easy to dispatch – the Mercedes had been short of power throughout as they struggled with cooling – and he was right on Leclerc’s tail with four laps to go. On Lap 68, Verstappen dived down the inside into Turn 3, allowing Leclerc a Ferrari’s width on the outside and they drag raced along the back straight with Leclerc coming out on top. One lap later, Verstappen made the same move but this time did not leave the room, taking the lead and then the victory – the first for a Honda engine since Jenson Button in 2006.

“Hard Racing” or “Not the Way You Overtake

As you would expect, Verstappen and Leclerc had very different views on the overtake. They both immediately came on the radio; Verstappen claiming Leclerc had turned in on him and Leclerc asking “what the hell is that?”

Image credit: DPPI

The stewards decided to investigate, with the result only being confirmed as a Verstappen victory three hours after he had taken the chequered flag. And so the conversation of what the rules should be and how they should be enforced reared its ugly head once more.

It is very easy to see why Ferrari and their fans could feel aggrieved. There have been two fairly similar incidents in which they have somehow lost out on both occasions, despite being on opposite sides of the two. Vettel was penalised for not leaving Hamilton a car’s width in Canada and the obvious differences between there and here are that Verstappen was fully in control of his vehicle and that Leclerc was fully alongside his rival. Both of which you could reasonably expect to further cement a penalty.

Personally, whilst I’m glad the result stood – the sport didn’t need another overturned win fiasco and Leclerc deserves a better maiden victory than being told three hours after the fact – I can’t help feeling that Formula 1 has contradicted itself. After the Vettel penalty, there was a lot of talk of ‘the letter of the law’ and so on, but now it’s about ‘the way to interpret the rules’. I refer back to my post after the Canadian Grand Prix and my opinion that the stewards should be a consistent panel of respected figures who are accountable and explain exactly how and why they have come to their decisions. There is no point having thousands of regulations if they are not airtight and leave so many situations that are open to interpretation – that has been the case in the three most recent races and they all appear to have been dealt with differently. It is obviously far easier said than done but a reasonable number of more iron-clad rules and a stable stewarding presence is surely the answer.

Whatever your opinion on the incident though, it could well turn out to be an infamous moment that defines the beginning of an intense rivalry. One that could even dominate the sport for the next decade.

McLaren Prosper Whilst Mercedes Faulter

McLaren continued their good run of form and excellent progress this season with 6th and 8th place finishes. Both impressive drives in very different circumstances. Norris showed his star potential again by qualifying 5th and then mixing it with the front-runners for a few laps before settling into a very solid 6th and holding off the other Red Bull of Pierre Gasly – yet another disappointing performance from the under-pressure Frenchman. Meanwhile, Carlos Sainz fought admirably from the back of the grid to end up 8th.

Lando Norris at the 2019 Austrian Grand Prix.
Image credit: DPA

To have had two great races back-to-back on such different tracks as Paul Ricard and the Red Bull Ring shows how much progress McLaren have made and, for all his undeniable talent, there is a distinct freshness to the team since Fernando Alonso’s departure. They are enjoying the challenge of their revival without the pressure that Alonso puts on a team. There are no politics; it’s just racing. And they continue to punch above their weight, or at least their weight of recent years.

Mercedes, however, finally had an off-week.

It’s unlikely to prove a huge turning point, as the unique combination of high temperatures and altitute, twinned with a very short track, meant they had cooling issues throughout the weekend. Their engines were not at full power and they were even having to do a considerable amount of ‘lift and coast’ during the race, where the drivers lift off the throttle up to 400m before the corner.

But certainly it bodes well for some more competitive races whilst temperatures are likely to be higher in the summer.

The Austrian Grand Prix in 60 Seconds

Session Progression

2019 French GP report | Hamilton cruises to victory

Posted on by James Mackenzie
Something of a damp squib after the high drama (or at least controversy) of last race.
Lewis Hamilton at the 2019 French Grand Prix.
Image credit: AFP

Damp squib or not, there is no denying Lewis Hamilton‘s brilliance at the front of the 2019 French Grand Prix.

It was all something of a walk in the park; albeit a hot, sweaty, tiring walk. Through the practice sessions, the balance of power had somewhat swung between himself and his teammate – Valtteri Bottas arguably even appearing to have the edge ahead of qualifying – but when it hit crunch time it was the reigning champion who delivered, as he so often does. An 18-second gap to 2nd place is an age in modern Formula 1. The mantra of winning as slowly as possible has become increasingly accepted, with the limit on engines meaning they are only used as much as is absolutely required. Hamilton’s lead in the championship is looking increasingly insurmountable.

Behind the two Mercedes, Charles Leclerc drove an excellent race to the final step of the podium, even closing and pressuring Bottas in the last couple of laps in what appeared to be an inferior car. Whilst his more experienced teammate, Sebastian Vettel, toiled – recovering from 7th to 5th after a poor qualifying – the young Monegasque shone. This was exactly the race he needed after a run of bad luck and costly mistakes had left him further back in the championship than was a true reflection of his quality. This was a very mature performance and one that will potentially turn senior Ferrari heads.

Vettel remains the de facto lead driver but, with it looking increasingly like Ferrari will not be involved in a serious title challenge this season, perhaps they’re better off letting their drivers fight and gaining Leclerc some valuable further experience.

Time Running Out For Gasly?

Whilst the locals were happy with quasi-French Leclerc’s podium, they must have been somewhat embarrassed by yet another lacklustre performance from their man at Red Bull. The Honda upgrade may not have made a noteworthy difference to the Red Bull performance but Max Verstappen still put in another solid performance to split the Ferraris and take another haul of points. Gasly, meanwhile, claimed one solitary point thanks to a 10-second penalty for Daniel Ricciardo.

Christian Horner recently made a pointed remark regarding Helmut Marko ‘softening in his old age’ but there are surely now discussions happening behind the scenes as to how you solve a problem like Pierre. The excuse of acclimatising to the car must be long gone but Gasly is still alarmingly far behind his teammate. Even with a softer tyre in Q2 than most of his competitors he only scraped into the top 10. How much longer can this continue? Daniil Kvyat was bumped down to Toro Rosso for far less… Admittedly with Verstappen crying out for his seat.

What saves Gasly could just be a lack of competition as it is surely too soon for Alexander Albon and there would be a significant slice of humble pie involved in re-promoting Kvyat…

A Renaissance in Papaya Orange

Carlos Sainz at the 2019 French Grand Prix.

The story of the weekend was arguably McLaren’s performance. 5th and 6th on the grid and out-qualifying the Ferrari of Vettel clearly meant a huge amount to the team as they celebrated on the pit wall. They had not expected to be particularly strong on this track after all. Coming into the weekend, all the attention had been on Renault’s upgrades and whether they could move clear of the midfield pack. But it was the other cars with the French engines that were to do so.

Come race day, the two orange cars held their own and looked comfortable for 6th and 7th – after Vettel had predictably passed them – only for Lando Norris to experience hydraulic issues in the closing stages of the race and agonisingly lose three places on the final lap. He regained one after Ricciardo’s penalty but 9th was not befitting of another excellent drive from the young rookie.

Nonetheless, this has been an excellent spell for the McLaren team. Their new Team Principal, Andreas Seidl, appears to be another solid addition to a much-improved leadership team as they continue their steady ascent towards former glories.

Championship Over?

With Mercedes seemingly having developed a car with no clear weaknesses this season and five-time world champion Hamilton hitting his stride, is the championship as good as done in June? The Briton has now opened up a 36-point gap over teammate Bottas after four wins on the trot. And the odds are he is just getting going.

Hamilton has generally always become stronger as the season progresses and he gets more comfortable with the car. Was Bottas 2.0 for real early in the season or was it just Hamilton getting his eye in? His new steely persona seemed to be visibly slipping as he crouched forlornly in the background after qualifying on Saturday and such a dominant performance one day later will surely have him wondering how, and if, he can compete with his illustrious teammate.

Image credit: LAT Images

Can the Finn make a fight of this championship still? The next race in Austria has been a strong one for him in recent years so he will really need to make the most of that. And maybe grow a 2nd beard?..

Oh and Ferrari…well, Vettel is now more than three clear victories behind Hamiton in the standings. I’ll leave it at that.

Answering the Burning Questions

Will Vettel’s penalty be overturned? Will the situation actually be resolved this weekend? No and yes, respectively. People even seemed to have moved on for the mostpart.

Can Bottas or Ferrari do something to reduce Hamilton’s momentum towards another title? Just a plain no for this one.

Can Renault’s aero upgrade help keep up the progress they’ve made in the last two races? McLaren stole their limelight but it was another decent race for the French team. Can’t say the upgrade made a noticeable difference though.

Will we have the same ridiculous trophy as last year? Yup. And a giant version of it next to the podium.

What effect will the new Honda engine have on Red Bull? Not much of one.

Will anyone make it through the race without a migraine from those stupid lines in the run-off area? I did, just about.

The French Grand Prix in 60 Seconds

Session Progression

A Quick Public Service Announcement

I’m heading off to Glastonbury in the morning (to work in a smoothie stall for a week) so there will be a bit of radio silence. And next week’s report will probably be a day or two late.

See you on the other side.

2019 Canadian GP report | Hamilton wins…but that’s not the headline

Posted on by James Mackenzie
A good race; a greater controversy.
Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel on the podium at the 2019 Canadian Grand Prix.
Image credit: Motorsport Images

Let’s get the basics out of the way. Lewis Hamilton claimed victory at the 2019 Canadian Grand Prix and Mercedes continued their clean sweep of wins.

However, it was in very controversial circumstances after Sebastian Vettel was given a five-second penalty for obstructing Hamilton as the German rejoined the circuit having ended up on the grass at Turns 3 and 4. More on that later. (In fact, most of the post will be about it as it’s all anyone is going to be talking about.) But firstly, let’s quickly address the rest of the race. (Feel free to scroll down if you’re only interested in the controversy…)

The front two were near enough in a race of their own throughout with Vettel’s teammate, Charles Leclerc, never quite in the fight and Hamilton’s teammate, Valtteri Bottas, a distant fourth. Leclerc will be pleased at least to bounce back from his eventful – for all the wrong reasons – home race two weeks ago with a solid podium but he still needs to work on his qualifying performances. Despite often looking the faster Ferrari through the practice sessions, he has made mistakes when it really counts and left himself with a lot to do on Sunday. Bottas unfortunately reverted to Bottas 1.0 and was never really on Hamilton’s pace all weekend. A very scruffy Q3, where he was lucky to escape the barriers after a spin, saw him start 6th. He then lost a position at the start, spent numerous laps stuck behind slower cars and is now 29 points behind his teammate in the standings.

Daniel Ricciardo continues to look more and more at home in the Renault, demonstrating his late-braking talents – which he had seemed to be struggling to dial in to his new car at the start of the year – to keep Bottas behind him for far longer than he had any right to. The Honey Badger ended the race a commendable 6th and was followed home by the sister Renault of Nico Hülkenberg to complete an excellent weekend for the French team on a track at which they had not expected to be all that successful.

Max Verstappen recovered well to 5th after unfortunate timing with a red flag in Q2 left him starting 9th on the grid, whilst teammate Pierre Gasly’s struggles continued as he went in the opposite direction, from 5th to 8th. Lance Stroll had an excellent home race, progressing from 17th on the grid to finish 9th, claiming two well-deserved points to silence some of his critics, at least for a while. And finally a quick mention also for the unfortunate Lando Norris, whose rear suspension seemingly melted thanks to severely overheating brakes – something I have never seen before in the sport – which put paid to a very promising race for the youngster. His car unusually left stranded at the side of the pit exit – because it was not in a dangerous position – evoked memories of the 90s where broken cars would be scattered around the track, abandoned. And of course he used his retirement to produce yet another meme.

What We’re All Here to Talk About

Now then. Where to begin…

What Happened

In arguably the battle of the year so far, Hamilton had been right on the tail of his long-term rival for some time. After the pit stops, he quickly closed a five-second gap and then began pressuring Vettel in what was shaping up to be a thrilling fight to the end of the race. We had already had nine laps of this when Vettel made a mistake under pressure – certainly not his first – and overcooked his entry into Turn 3, catching a snap of oversteer but in the process having to take to the grass.

Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel during the defining moment of the 2019 Canadian Grand Prix.
Image credit: LAT Images

This is where the controversy occurs. Vettel rejoined the track very close to Hamilton, who tried to go around the outside but then backed out as he was squeezed towards the wall. Hamilton came on the radio to say that Vettel had rejoined the track dangerously – understandably so when you see the incident from his on-board camera – and after a few minutes of investigation, the stewards handed Vettel a five-second time penalty. With that, the race effectively died. Whilst Hamilton states he continued to try and pass for the remaining laps, and to his credit he certainly didn’t just sit three or four seconds back and coast home, there was no real need for him to take any risks.

Vettel spent the remainder of the race understandably fuming and then, in bizarre scenes, parked his car as far as he could from the designated spot in parc fermé and stormed off to Ferrari hospitality, before being fetched by an official and his media adviser. He then returned for the podium via the Mercedes garage and a brief stop to switch the number boards, placing the ‘number one’ in front of the space where his car would have been and the ‘number two’ in front of Hamilton’s car. Credit where credit’s due: that is a baller move.

Now. For 95% of people, at least judging by social media, this appears to be a slam dunk and not up for debate; it was totally the incorrect decision and a huge injustice for the Ferrari driver. But as I see it – and I have looked into this in massive depth over the last 24 hours – it’s a closer call than that. There are many aspects to examine in little over a second of action and then many different ways to interpret the minutiae. Every point has a caveat and I could easily follow most of the following sentences with a ‘but’ or a ‘however’…and in fact I do a fair few times. Let’s start with the fundamentals: the rules.

The Rules

Here are two pertinent regulations.

The first: “Should a car leave the track the driver may rejoin, this may only be done when it is safe to do so and without gaining any lasting advantage.” Removing this from the bigger picture, putting it plainly in black and white, Vettel did return to the track in an unsafe manner and he did gain a lasting advantage in that if he’d rejoined more slowly and safely, Hamilton would have passed him. Only he didn’t really have the opportunity to do so. He was simply trying to recover control of the car the entire time he was on the grass and in the split second which followed on the track. The first time he checks his mirrors is around the point at which Hamilton had to bail out. Having said that, it’s down to his mistake that he is in that position so why should Hamilton be the one to suffer? (See what I mean about the caveats?..) As Hamilton put it, “I was just driving the normal line so I shouldn’t have been in the position of being close to crashing. It was his responsibility to avoid that, but it ended up being mine. So because of that I lost a chance of passing”.

The second: “Manoeuvres liable to hinder other drivers, such as deliberate crowding of a car beyond the edge of the track or any other abnormal change of direction, are strictly prohibited.” Similarly, whilst Vettel was not in control and thus the ‘deliberate’ aspect can be ignored, Hamilton was certainly hindered. But, by definition, a manoeuvre is ‘a movement requiring skill’, so surely not being in control means this can’t be classed as one. Either way, it has now come to light that a large part of the stewards’ decision came from Vettel’s movements after regaining control. Their data shows that, after checking his mirror, he opened the steering to move towards the edge of the track. Certainly a manoeuvre this time but up for debate whether, by that point, it was impeding Hamilton.

It all boils down to what each fan or member of the F1 paddock wants from the rules. They are a necessary evil. Remember how angry everyone was when Verstappen came on the scene and repeatedly exploited loopholes to defend dangerously? There have to be lines somewhere and, once those lines are drawn, surely they have to be enforced. The gravity of the situation shouldn’t be a factor. If this had happened between Sergio Pérez and Antonio Giovinazzi for 12th place, there is less at stake, and people obviously wouldn’t feel as passionately, but does that mean that the situation should be ruled differently?

Precedent

The bigger picture here is the consistency of rulings. Whilst most fans immediately stated that they are inconsistent, an almost identical incident between Verstappen and, ironically, then-Ferrari-driver Kimi Räikkönen at last year’s Japanese Grand Prix also brought about a five-second penalty. At the time, most seemed to go with the opinion of harsh but fair, and Ferrari obviously thought so. Vettel himself said “Look at Kimi. [Verstappen]’s off the track and he comes back and if Kimi just drives on they’d collide. But it’s not always right that the other guy has to move.” Sound familiar? The late, great Charlie Whiting described it as “a fairly straightforward one for the stewards”.

Here comes another caveat though. There was also a pretty similar incident between Ricciardo and Hamilton at Monaco in 2016 which was not penalised. This one was also for the lead of the race so had the same gravitas as Vettel and Hamilton’s incident. Did that factor in to the decision? Only the stewards will know. At the time, some certainly thought he was lucky to get away with it.

Just one more point to add to this already perplexing and convoluted mire I’ve created. Hypothetically, if Hamilton had kept his foot in and they had both ended up in the wall, what penalty, if any, would fans have expected to be dished out?

An Attempt at a Conclusion

So this is the crux of the matter. Did Vettel rejoin the track in an unsafe manner and cause Hamilton to take avoiding action? Yes. Did he have any control of that once off the track? No. Was it his fault he was off the track and thus out of control? Yes. This could go on and on, further down the rabbit hole.

We as fans have to accept that the stewards have far more information than us to base their decisions on and that they are more experienced than 99% of us. But it would be far easier to do so if there were a consistent panel of respected figures who were accountable and then came out and explained exactly how and why they came to their decisions. Surely that’s not too hard for the senior leaders to put together. The fact that the crowd ends up booing Hamilton – surely an innocent party in this whole debacle – in the absence of anywhere else to direct their anger, is a real shame.

It is hard to come to a definitive conclusion. I remain somewhat on the fence. I am fully for hard racing but I also understand that there have to be rules and, with the rules that we have currently, I can see why they came to the decision that they did. In this instance, they have applied the letter of the law rather than spirit of the law. The bigger question is whether the rules need to be amended. Generally this year the stewards have been more lenient and the public and pundits have seemed happy with it.

I guess it depends whether Liberty Media want the headlines to come from the racing or the controversy. As, if we can be certain about one thing in all this, it is that more lenient stewarding would have resulted in a far better end to the race.

Well, that and the days of ‘Ferrari International Assistance’ being long gone.

Answering the Burning Questions

(I guess I should still answer these…)

Will the track really favour Ferrari as predicted? We’ve heard that a few times this year.. Yes, for once the top two teams were evenly matched.

How much of an improvement will the Mercedes engine upgrade provide? Not a significant one seemingly. Also, one of them blew up…

Will the Wall of Champions claim any new victims? Kevin Magnussen had a brush with it but properly crashed on the other side of the track. And isn’t a champion anyway.

Can Bottas continue to get on top in qualifying or will Monaco prove a turning point? It’s looking more like the latter.

Will Leclerc bounce back from his less-than-ideal home Grand Prix? It was certainly an improvement, if not a great weekend.

Session Progression

2019 Monaco GP report | Hamilton takes emotional victory

Posted on by James Mackenzie
Niki would be proud.
Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel at the 2019 Monaco Grand Prix.
Image credit: Getty Images

The run of Mercedes 1-2s finally came to an end at the 2019 Monaco Grand Prix, to be replaced by a Niki Lauda 1-2.

Lewis Hamilton took the victory in a McLaren-era Lauda helmet, followed (once Max Verstappen’s penalty had been applied) by the Ferrari-era Lauda helmet donned by Sebastian Vettel. It was a very fitting result for what was always going to be a poignant, somewhat muted Monaco Grand Prix weekend – a dampener put on all the glitz, glamour and indulgent festivities that the Monte Carlo race usually brings.

Whilst Monaco is often accused of being a procession, this was certainly no walk in the park for Hamilton. After an early safety car – brought out by Charles Leclerc’s gingerbread trail of bits of tyre and Ferrari floor – Mercedes placed their drivers on the medium tyre whilst Verstappen and Vettel went for the harder option. Verstappen and Valtteri Bottas then collided in the pit lane, leaving the former with a five second penalty and the latter needing to come in due to the damage. At this point, Mercedes changed Bottas to the harder tyre and Hamilton came to the realisation that he was facing the prospect of nursing his tyres for 67 laps with cars attacking him on better-suited rubber.

Toto Wolff later admitted that this was a rare strategic mistake from Mercedes, although their decision was justifiable at the time. They were wary of being jumped after the safety car if their competitors were on softer tyres, the hard tyre had proved tricky during practice and there was also the prospect of rain – sadly, for the spectacle, it never materialised beyond some light drizzle – with the medium the better tyre for damp conditions. It is always tricky to be the lead team in these situations as those following can react to your decisions.

Either way, Hamilton succeeded in fending off the increasingly aggressive Verstappen, who knew that second place would turn into fourth after the penalty if he could not pass, for a victory of perseverance and fighting against the odds. Everything that encapsulated Niki Lauda.

More Ferrari Woes

It was yet another tale of blunders from both team and drivers for Ferrari. They had looked well off the pace during the Thursday practice sessions but found some speed on Saturday morning with Leclerc topping the timesheets. Only for the sister car of Vettel to end up in the wall at Sainte Devote. The engineers did a good job to get it repaired in time for qualifying but that’s where things really started to unravel.

Vettel’s first attempt in Q1 left him in the drop zone. Leclerc also had a scrappy lap which was only 0.2 seconds quicker than his teammate’s but the team decided to try and save tyres by not sending him out, despite their driver’s repeated questioning of that decision. So the young Monegasque had to sit and watch from the garage as ‘LEC’ fell further and further down the timings screen, before being finally knocked into 16th, and out of qualifying, by Vettel of all people.

In the face of some trying times – particularly having victory cruelly snatched away in Bahrain – Leclerc has remained calm and said all the right things. But here, he was visibly furious. Monaco is his home race after all and he knows as well as anyone that passing around the Principality is almost impossible. He decided to go with an all or nothing approach on Sunday. Sadly it was to be the latter as, after an excellent pass on Romain Grosjean at La Rascasse the lap previously, Nico Hülkenberg proved to be less accommodating and Leclerc clipped the barrier. This left him with with a puncture which resulted in terminal damage to the car as he returned to the pits far too fast, clearly having reached the end of his tether.

Meanwhile Vettel, after a scruffy remainder of the qualifying session where he touched the barriers twice, did at least bring home second place come race day. Bizarrely Ferrari’s best result of the year despite the weekend as a whole feeling very much a failure. There is still a long way to go before the systematic issues in Ferrari’s operations are ironed out.

Sainz Continues to Excel Under the Radar

I have, for a long time, felt that Carlos Sainz is criminally underrated.

This is a driver who generally matched Verstappen in their time together at Toro Rosso. The Dutchman scored more points and was more spectacular but Sainz beat him in their qualifying head-to-head before suffering poor luck on race days for the most part.

Whilst Verstappen was hurried up the Red Bull ladder, Sainz’s career stalled somewhat as he spent season after season with Toro Rosso. He finally got his move to Renault towards the end of 2017 but there was to be more bad luck on race days and a very in-form teammate in Nico Hülkenberg. The German scored more points and many seemingly wrote off the still very young Sainz, despite the fact that the Hulk is no slouch, was fully settled in the team and, apparently, Sainz never particularly got on with the Renault’s handling.

Image credit: AFP

But this year, he has a clean slate. He has taken the seat of his boyhood hero, Fernando Alonso, at McLaren and is now finding his feet. After some misfortune and a poor decision to try and squeeze Verstappen that cost him an excellent result in Bahrain, Sainz has really started to perform, culminating in an excellent drive to sixth in Monaco. It also included what Sainz described as “the best move of my career” as he opportunistically carved round the outside of both Toro Rossos at Massenet on Lap 1.

Up against a highly-rated rookie in Lando Norris, Sainz seems to be relishing the role of team leader and it will be interesting to see whether both he and McLaren can continue their progress towards the front of the grid. Maybe we’ll see him back fighting regularly with Verstappen soon enough.

One Very Important Moment Swept Under the Rug

Not broadcast by FOM, a marshal was centimetres from being injured, or even killed, on Sunday.

The marshals at Monaco are generally accepted as being some of the best in the world. In the most constricted surroundings on the calendar, they have always dealt with incidents impressively quickly and efficiently. But it must be remembered that they are volunteers following orders. And when those orders result in a situation like this, Sergio Pérez doing well to keep his head and narrowly avoid two marshals crossing his path, the situation must be examined.

The Monaco Grand Prix in 60 Seconds

Answering the Burning Questions

Surely Mercedes can’t claim another 1-2?! It looked like it was heading that way after qualifying but they’ll have to settle for a lowly 1-3 this time.

Can Max Verstappen keep it out of the wall this year? He can.

Something of a Monaco expert, and on a track with less engine-dependence, can Daniel Ricciardo spring a surprise? An excellent performance in qualifying but poor strategy stifled his race somewhat.

Will Charles Leclerc’s home knowledge see him outclass his teammate? He had seemed the faster driver through practice but Ferrari’s error left him in a different race. A race that, as it transpired, did not last long.

It’s currently due to rain at some point over the weekend…could we have a classic Monaco race rather than a procession? It wasn’t a classic but it was at least a tense procession. Maybe rain next year?..

2019 Spanish GP report | Another Mercedes 1-2

Posted on by James Mackenzie
Great first corner…not too much after that.
Lewis Hamilton, Valtteri Bottas and Sebastian Vettel go three wide into the first corner of the 2019 Spanish Grand Prix.
Image credit: Octane Photographic

Lewis Hamilton dominated at the 2019 Spanish Grand Prix as Mercedes secured yet another 1-2.

On Saturday, Valtteri Bottas, in full Bottas 2.0 mode, produced a stunning qualifying lap to take pole from his teammate, Hamilton, by 0.6 seconds. People don’t tend to do that to Hamilton… The reigning champion said he “just didn’t put the laps together” but was determined to make amends come race day. And that he did. Good starts from Hamilton and the Ferrari of Sebastian Vettel, combined with another poor one from Bottas, led to all three racing into the first corner side by side. Bottas found himself the filling in that sandwich and had to back out but Vettel, desperate to be the latest on the brakes, locked up and ran wide, handing second place back to the Finn. And from there, the remainder of the race turned out to be something of a formality.

Bottas believes his poor start was due to a mechanical issue rather than any failure on his part, saying “I had a strange behaviour on the clutch; biting, releasing, biting, releasing. I’ve never had it before. So I lost it there. I’m keen to find out why the start was so bad and why the issue happened.”

A late safety car, caused by a collision between the two youngest drivers on the grid in Lando Norris and Lance Stroll, closed the pack up but produced no further action at the front and Mercedes further extended their latest record, with a fifth consecutive 1-2 from the start of the season. Max Verstappen continued to impress with an excellent drive to take the final step on the podium, navigating the first corner with maturity and nous before flawlessly executing a move around the outside of both Ferraris when the chance presented itself.

Next up is the Monaco Grand Prix, where Mercedes have struggled in recent years. But judging by their performance in sector three at Barcelona – a sequence of slow corners, similar to the Monte Carlo track – where they were generally more than half a second faster than the Ferraris, another 1-2 is far from out of the question. It is beginning to look like Bottas 2.0 could be the only thing that keeps this championship interesting.

The Debate is Emphatically Over: Ferrari Are Just not Fast Enough

A result in Barcelona would have kept some hopes alive of the Scuderia taking the fight to Mercedes this year. But this was – along with the opening race in Melbourne – the most resounding defeat yet. Throughout pre-season testing, at the very same track, Ferrari had given the impression that they were the team to beat, but just over two months later the Silver Arrows were in a class of one. And to make it worse, their drivers’ squabbling for position arguably cost Ferrari third place to Verstappen.

Vettel’s daring attempt around the outside at the first corner ultimately ended in him running wide and, upon rejoining the track, he put his car very much in the way of Charles Leclerc. thus allowing Verstappen to sail around the outside of both red cars. From there, they never really challenged the Dutchman and instead got caught up again with whether to use team orders. Firstly, with Leclerc stuck behind Vettel, who was suffering with a flat spot from his first corner lock-up, and then the reverse when Vettel caught Leclerc with the young Monegasque on old, hard tyres. Hearing the two drivers’ team radios, it becomes clear that their respective race engineers were on different pages. In the situation where Leclerc was the driver in front, his engineer was somehow unaware that the two drivers were on different strategies. These are basic errors.

This was supposed to be Ferrari’s season. But, after missing out on potential victories in Bahrain and Azerbaijan through a combination of mechanical, operational and driver errors, they now find themselves 96 points behind Mercedes after just five races. Along with the obligatory aero update for Spain, a new power unit was rushed through and fitted two races earlier than planned. But the aero upgrade that Mercedes brought is believed to have been worth three to four tenths on its own and thoroughly trumped whatever improvements Ferrari had managed. It is starting to look like the Italian team are more likely battling Red Bull for second place than Mercedes for first, with team principal Matteo Binotto going as far as saying that the problem was “maybe even car concept”. If so, that is not going to be fixable during the season.

The Last Spanish Grand Prix?

The rumours are that this will be the last Spanish Grand Prix, for the time being at least and almost certainly with Barcelona as its venue. Spain is one of five races without contracts for next year, along with Great Britain, Mexico, Italy and Germany. The organisers for the Italian Grand Prix have agreed a deal in principle and Silverstone looks likely to follow. But there is apparently a good chance the other three could all fall off the calendar.

I would hope as a fairly recent addition, and with a clearly very passionate following, Mexico can figure something out. But Spain and Germany feel perhaps in need of a change. There have been few notable races in Barcelona’s 28-year history – barring Pastor Maldonado’s extraordinary victory in 2012 – and crowds this year have visibly reduced, most likely due to Fernando Alonso’s departure from the sport. Germany has been struggling for a while now, briefly alternating between the Hockenheimring and the Nürburgring, before the latter proved unable to host a Grand Prix any longer. And then having the event cancelled altoghether in 2015 and 2017. Spain and Germany are major European countries with a history of motorsport though so it would be good to see them reinvigorated and returned to the calendar in some way.

Image credit: Formula 1

Whether as direct replacements or not, there will be the brand new Vietnamese Grand Prix and – expected to be confirmed on Tuesday – a return to Zandvoort for the Dutch Grand Prix. We will have to see how these work out. Vietnam is yet another new location in Asia without any significant motorsport heritage and will be another Hermann Tilke-designed circuit. Zandvoort is in need of a significant upgrade in the next 12 months to be ready for F1. Both in terms of infrastructure and the track itself.

Maybe the Regulations Have Worked

Whilst there was little to no action at the front, the midfield teams all continued to duke it out for the positions around the fringes of the top 10. And that’s on a track where passing has always been difficult. Romain Grosjean’s Haas seemed to spend more time in the run-off area around turns one and two than on the track, after wheel-banging moments with his teammate, amongst others. Scenes that I’m sure led to a few more coins entering Guenther Steiner’s swear jar.

Throughout Formula 1.5, there was a decent amount of battling so, whilst nobody seems to be particularly discussing it, maybe the stop-gap regulation changes for this year have helped somewhat when it comes to the on-track action. That bodes well for the major regulation changes in 2021. We live in hope.

The Spanish Grand Prix in 60 Seconds

Answering the Burning Questions

Can anyone stop Mercedes and will Bottas 2.0 keep it up? An emphatic no to the first part and a tentative yes to the second. Bottas on Saturday was exceptional but Hamilton had him covered on Sunday.

With updates everywhere, will the pecking order change noticeably? Not particularly. Although Haas appear to have fixed their tyre issues and moved up the field.

Who will be the faster Ferrari driver this time? In terms of pure results, Vettel. But it was mostly strategy and a small error from Leclerc on Saturday that saw to that.

Will the Williams updates restore some credibility to the team? They were slightly closer to the pack – at least in the hands of George Russell – but there’s a fair way to go still.

Will anyone pull a Pastor Maldonado? That will be a no.

2019 Azerbaijan GP report | The return of Bottas 2.0

Posted on by James Mackenzie
Apparently Azerbaijan used up its quota of carnage on Friday and Saturday.
Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton after the 2019 Azerbaijan Grand Prix.
Image credit: Steve Etherington

Valtteri Bottas took his second win of the season and the championship lead after an impressive performance at a surprisingly uneventful 2019 Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

After an impressive start to the season with a dominant victory at Melbourne (albeit with Lewis Hamilton having suffered floor damage), the supposed rebirth of Bottas in 2019 as much more than just a ‘wingman’ had seemed to stutter. He was nowhere in Bahrain and, after taking pole in China, was beaten off the line by Hamilton and never really threatened for the remainder of the race. But the Finn was near enough flawless in Baku, grabbing what looked an unlikely pole position, holding his own in the first few corners and then not putting a foot wrong on his way to victory and the lead of the championship.

Hamilton will have regrets though. He had been the stronger Mercedes driver through the practice sessions and the earlier parts of qualifying. He produced an excellent first lap in Q3 but on the second runs, after Mercedes had successfully thrown Ferrari and Sebastian Vettel a dummy, they got their timings a bit wrong. Both drivers were at the back of a queue of drivers trying to get space for their runs. Hamilton was worst affected, losing a lot of tyre temperature which caused him to lose three tenths in the first sector and he couldn’t quite claw that back through the rest of the lap. He got the better start on Sunday but, as he put it, was “a little bit too kind”, giving his teammate a lot of space as they ran wheel-to-wheel. From there, despite following closely throughout, he never really got another chance.

You get the sense that the world champion still feels pretty comfortable that he has Bottas covered. Or maybe it’s just that he genuinely gets on with the Finn and is enjoying an honest fight after all the psychological warfare with Nico Rosberg. Either way, Bottas 2.0 still has a long way to go. He should have been leading the championship at this point last year too but for a dramatic puncture. The European season was where Hamilton started to pull away and he is infamously strong in the latter part of the year, as the tension builds. Maintaining the fight will be far from easy for Bottas but, if Ferrari continue to falter, hopefully he can do so for the sake of a competitive championship. Speaking of which…

Are Ferrari Actually Fast?

Another race and another missed opportunity for the Scuderia. At what point though do we actually start to question the speed of the car? In Bahrain, they were clearly quickest, certainly in the hands of Charles Leclerc. In China, Mercedes regained the upper hand. Through practice in Azerbaijan, they were miles ahead – over a second in Practice 3 – and it looked like we might have another season where certain tracks are more suited to each of the two leading teams and a title battle that would swing to and fro.

Image credit: Getty Images

But it all unravelled after Leclerc’s crash in qualifying and here we are with a record-breaking fourth consecutive 1-2 finish from the start of the season for Mercedes. How much of that is down to the ongoing operational issues that have hindered Ferrari over the past few years and how much of it is just a lack of pace? Qualifying would appear to be down to the former but then Vettel didn’t really look like threatening the Mercedes at any point during the race. Or is it just those Mercedes sandbags out in force again? At least it meant they didn’t have to deal with team orders…

Barcelona will be key. People were referring to the race in Azerbaijan as a must-win for the red cars; Barcelona is far more of one in this writer’s opinion. Testing at Barcelona was what had fans, pundits and the media alike convinced that Ferrari were the team to beat this year. If they get comfortably beaten there too, that could be it. Last year, Mercedes had built a wild animal of a car but learnt how to tame it. This year, it seems they are the ones with the more consistent machine and Ferrari have built the wild animal…but have no ringmaster to do the taming.

What Happened to the Baku Mayhem?

Well, it all happened too early really. A Chuckle Brothers-esque start to the weekend saw a loose manhole cover thankfully not cause any harm to George Russell but cause a lot of damage to his car a few minutes in. Then the rescue truck that came to pick up the Williams promptly crashed into a bridge and proceeded to leak hydraulic fluid on the car. Talk about insult to injury. Practice 1 was cancelled as they checked the bridge and 300 manhole covers around the circuit.

Saturday was all about Turn 8. First Robert Kubica and then, more dramatically, Leclerc’s Ferrari ended up in the barriers there, each causing long delays whilst it was repaired. But sadly, in terms of a spectacle at least, Sunday passed mostly without incident. Except for Daniel Ricciardo bizarrely reversing into his former teammate, Daniil Kvyat, after the Australian had outbraked himself in an overtaking attempt and forced them both down an escape road.

Another Draining Weekend for Williams

Yes, that’s a drain pun. No, I’m not sorry.

If people thought things couldn’t get worse for the Williams team, they were proven thoroughly wrong by the weekend’s events in Baku. First there was the drain cover incident, destroying the floor of Russell’s car and damaging the chassis severely enough that it had to be replaced. Claire Williams put the damage in the hundreds of thousands and stated she would be “taking it up with race control”.

Image credit: AFP via Getty Images

And then Kubica binned the sister car in Q1 on Saturday. Some feared Williams wouldn’t have the spare parts to rebuild another car after having to use the spare chassis for Russell, but fortunately they did and at least both cars were able to compete on Sunday. Not without one more kick in the teeth though. Kubica received a drive-through penalty for ‘pit lane irregularities’, with the team apparently confused as to what they had done wrong. It transpired that, with this being their first pit lane start since the race times shifted to 10 past the hour, Williams hadn’t clocked (no pun intended this time) that you’re supposed to bring the car to the exit 20 minutes before the race start time as opposed to 20 minutes before the hour…

It feels that Williams could, and should, be learning from McLaren. In coming to the realisation that their way of working was outdated and to then basically strip everything apart and rebuild from scratch. Zak Brown has done that for the more recent of the two British former champions and they are now pushing on and regaining dignity and competitiveness, with a solid double-points finish in Baku. But as things stand, it appears that Williams are too proud. And if they’re not careful, that could be their downfall.

The Azerbaijan Grand Prix in 60 Seconds

Answering the Burning Questions

Will there be more team orders at Ferrari? Leclerc’s crash removed that specific elephant from the room.

Can either Ferrari or Red Bull’s upgrades take them to the front? It looked like that could be the case for Ferrari on Friday but by Sunday normal service seems to have resumed.

Will Azerbaijan keep up its so far 100% record of producing highly dramatic races? No.

Will any of the midfield teams stake a claim for being best of the rest? Racing Point and McLaren had strong races but overall it’s still certainly in the balance.

2019 Chinese (1000th) GP report | Hamilton wins with ease

Posted on by James Mackenzie
Mercedes domination and Ferrari politics. Not much has changed in 1000 races.
Lewis Hamilton wins F1's 1000th grand prix.
Image credit: Daimler AG

Lewis Hamilton recovered from a tricky start to the weekend at the 2019 Chinese Grand Prix and ultimately took a comfortable win on what was Formula 1’s 1000th grand prix.

Coming into the weekend, most were expecting Ferrari to be on top. It was somewhat in the balance, with the top two teams having had superiority at one race each this year, but the track layout appeared to favour Ferrari. Particularly considering their straight line speed and the Shanghai International Circuit’s 1.2 km back straight. But it was the Mercedes team who seemed to have the edge throughout the weekend.

The Ferraris had two main problems. Firstly, they don’t seem to be able to release their full engine power consistently on a Sunday. Surely if that’s the case on a grey day in April, they are going to struggle at most races. And secondly, they were losing so much to Mercedes on the long, right-hand corner before the straight, that it didn’t matter anyway. There could be fundamental issues with this car.

Between the two drivers of the Silver Arrows, Valtteri Bottas had held a reasonably comfortable margin of around half a second over his world champion teammate through all the practice sessions. But then Lewis Hamilton did what Lewis Hamilton does. He pulled a bunch of speed from nowhere in qualifying to get within a few hundredths of the Finn’s pole time, then nailed the start and never looked back, sailing off into the distance to claim the honour of winning F1’s 1000th race. The Ferraris meanwhile were struggling – not only with speed but also decision-making…

Ferrari Team Orders: Round 3

That’s three team orders given out in the first three races…and not much to show for them. Charles Leclerc has remained magnanimous and toed the company line thus far, but has certainly given the impression that he has a backbone and won’t stand for this in the long run. In Australia, he dutifully stayed behind Sebastian Vettel in the closing stages despite clearly being faster. In Bahrain, he was asked to stay behind for two laps (for a reason I’m unsure of) but the pass presented itself too easily and he was gone. And now in China, he has been asked to move aside, before being sacrificed in an attempt to slow up Bottas.

At the time, the first part of that was pretty understandable – Vettel had been the quicker driver through the weekend and did appear to be stuck behind his teammate. But once freed, he didn’t get away…the Mercedes did. But the second part harked back to the days of Kimi Räikkönen being left on an incomprehensible strategy, purely to cost a Mercedes maybe a couple of tenths. Ferrari waited too long to order Vettel past and his tyres were already damaged from Leclerc’s dirty air, but it doesn’t look like they were ever going to challenge Mercedes this weekend. All they did was cost themselves a 4th place finish.

It could be argued that without these team orders Leclerc would be significantly closer to Hamilton in the title race than Vettel is even with their favouring of him. Either way, these team orders will only matter if Ferrari solve their car issues. And fast.

A Flying McLaren and a Flying Thai

McLaren came back down to earth with a bang here (quite literally in the case of Lando Norris) after their excellent result in Bahrain. They had said that they expected to struggle in Shanghai and so it proved to be with the drivers only managing to qualify 14th and 15th. And then came the torpedo. In fairness, Daniil Kvyat can count himself quite unlucky to receive that penalty. Whilst a little clumsy from the Russian, it looked the type of crash that would normally be filed under ‘first lap racing incident’. Norris was rejoining the track at a pretty sharp angle and left the other McLaren of Carlos Sainz nowhere to go. Add in a bit of understeer from Kvyat and you have an airborne teenager and three damaged cars. Norris did at least utilise the opportunity to continue his reign as F1’s Resident Memelord.

Meanwhile, his former GP2 rival, Alexander Albon, was not long out of the pit lane and possibly wondering if he was set for a tough race fighting his way into the midfield. You could wonder how a rookie would cope mentally with a big crash in Practice 3 that left him out of qualifying and starting from the pit lane. The answer, in this case, was ‘commendably’. The young Thai driver moved slowly but surely through the field and somehow found himself in the points, then impressively holding off Romain Grosjean’s Haas in the final few laps despite being on far older tyres. These are the kind of performances that could have him entering the frame for a future Red Bull drive. And one that could be not too far away considering Pierre Gasly’s current struggles…

An Underwhelming 1000th Grand Prix

The Grand Prix was fairly uneventful beyond the first few laps, but it was the event itself that particularly disappointed. It had been built up for a long time, with a countdown extending back to last season, but in the end it was something of a damp squib.

It’s a shame number 1000 ended up falling in China. The complexities of getting old champions and cars to Shanghai proved too much, so we were left with just Damon Hill driving his father’s Lotus 49B. It also doesn’t help that the country itself has little to no motorsport heritage. Just look at all the empty stands. The promoters claim it was sold out but that’s only due to them closing huge expanses of grandstand. This should have been a massive event. Race 1000 – that’s the milestone. But for all the build up, in reality it amounted to not much more than a few special helmets, some stickers on the cars and the champagne bottles being painted red.

Still, at least people on Reddit made some cool stuff.

The 1000th Grand Prix in 60 Seconds

Answering the Burning Questions

Will Charles Leclerc pick up where he left off after his stunning performance in Bahrain? Not quite. But it’s complicated…

With one dominant race each (in terms of pace anyway), who will come out on top between Mercedes and Ferrari this time? Mercedes, pretty comprehensively.

Can Pierre Gasly get his Red Bull closer to its probably rightful place in the top 6? Well, he did get into the top 6… And claimed the fastest lap. But realistically was still a long way shy of Max Verstappen’s pace.

What happened to Bottas 2.0? Will he reappear here? Inconclusive. Was it Lewis lacking early in the weekend or Bottas 2.0? Either way, we know who ended up with the win.

Who will have the best special one-off helmet design for the 1000th GP? For me, the retro simplicity of Daniel Ricciardo’s Brabham-inspired lid takes it.

2019 Bahrain GP report | A maiden victory snatched away

Posted on by James Mackenzie
Oh, Charles.
Charles Leclerc at the 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix.
Image credit: Ferrari/Colombo

Formula 1 can be such a cruel sport…and we saw it at its most callous on Sunday, as Charles Leclerc was denied a maiden victory at the 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix, with Lewis Hamilton picking up the spoils.

Leclerc had driven near enough flawlessly all weekend, barring maybe half of the first lap, and he looked to be heading towards his first victory in the sport, in only his second race for Ferrari. But then came a radio message. “There is something strange with the engine.” And so unravelled a fairy tale.

It wasn’t to be for Leclerc as his engine, down on power due to an injector failure, left him a sitting duck on the straights. Lewis Hamilton almost-apologetically passed him to take the chequered flag, as did Valtteri Bottas, before Leclerc was at least saved a place on the podium thanks to a late safety car caused by a bizarre, synchronised double-Renault-failure. The dignity and grace with which he took such a crushing blow was as impressive as his speed – an incredibly mature head on such young shoulders.

But the story of the day was clear: Leclerc is now undeniably a championship contender. As Sebastian Vettel’s chances slipped away with a spin reminiscent of his struggles last season, the young Monegasque kept his cool and sailed off into the distance. Ferrari have clearly fixed their issues from the first race and, whilst Bahrain has always been a strong track for them, this bodes well for a competitive season. The red cars had straight line speed that their competitors struggled to comprehend and, assuming there is nothing sneaky going on that will subsequently be banned, that is hard to fight against. I expect superiority to swing between Ferrari and Mercedes throughout the year, dependent on tracks and updates, but we now have enough evidence to believe that this shouldn’t be the year of Mercedes-dominance the opener hinted at. And that it could well be Leclerc taking the fight to them rather than his multiple world champion teammate…

The Heir to Hamilton’s Throne?

It is very early days, of course, but the start to Lando Norris’s F1 career has been very impressive. When I say ‘the heir to Hamilton’s throne’, I do not necessarily mean I expect him to be a future five-time world champion obviously – that’s just setting the kid up for a massive fall – but more that British fans will want a new home-grown star to cheer for in a few years, whenever the current superstar decides to hang up his racing boots.

That’s not to say that they shouldn’t be cheering for him already. Norris comes across as a very down-to-earth lad – I mean, he’s normally competing online with Joe Public on iRacing hours before a race – with a good sense of humour. Oh, and he’s pretty damn quick too. There have been many junior careers that have promised much but failed to deliver once at the very top table. Norris has won most series he has entered at the first attempt and, having been given his chance early, has taken very little time to appear settled in F1. Any left wondering about his racecraft or wheel-to-wheel credentials, after he spent a few laps stuck behind Antonio Giovinazzi in Melbourne, had their questions answered this race with both some great overtakes and defensive driving, keeping a former world champion (who is more than double his age) behind him to claim an excellent 6th place.

It should be noted of course that he was not the only young Brit to join the grid this year. George Russell even beat Norris to the F2 title last year. Unfortunately, he is currently hampered with an uncompetitive Williams and a teammate who, should he continue to stay in front of, will most likely be sadly written-off as too injured to to be considered a yardstick. But both he and Thai-British rookie Alexander Albon have been impressing so far. Time will tell who of last year’s F2 top three is really the biggest talent but, in the meantime, we can feel safe that the future of British motorsport looks rosy.

Is Dr. Marko Oiling Up the Guillotine?

Pierre Gasly has to find some speed, simply put, and pretty sharpish too. Max Verstappen on the other side of your garage would be intimidating for most on the grid, but currently he is making Gasly look decidedly average. We know about Red Bull’s – or rather Helmut Marko’s – history of impatience with underperforming drivers and there were the first few comments starting to appear over the weekend about it being unacceptable that they were fighting in the midfield.

Max Verstappen at the 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix.
Image credit: Getty Images

All that said, it appears Red Bull are still to fully understand the intricacies of their new car and it appears as if it may be a bit of a diva. So one would hope the Frenchman is given some time to find his feet. Another reassuring factor for him will be that there is not an obvious replacement – surely Daniil Kvyat’s rollercoaster of a career with the Red Bull programme wouldn’t see them rushing to put him back into the senior team and it is certainly too early for Albon at the moment.

I’d advise Gasly not to start watching the new series of Game of Thrones though…just in case…

The Bahrain Grand Prix in 60 Seconds

Answering the Burning Questions

Was Australia a blip for Ferrari or is there a more fundamental problem with this year’s car?Would appear pretty safe to say it was a blip.

Is Bottas really rejuvenated and now a force to be reckoned with? Jury’s out. Normal Hamilton dominance was resumed this race but apparently Bottas had a plastic bag stuck in/on the car for a portion of the race which hampered performance.

Will the new regulations provide better racing at a track with a better potential for wheel-to-wheel racing? That was certainly a great race and with a good amount of on-track battling. Looks promising.

Can Leclerc push on from a mixed first weekend for the Scuderia and properly take the challenge to Vettel? Yes. And then some.

Will the Ricciardo-Hamilton/Avocado&Ham bromance continue? Saw no evidence of any further bromancing.