THE SAUDI ARABIAN GP IN 3 KEY MOMENTS
1
Hamilton draws level with ‘over the limit’ Verstappen
Relations between Mercedes and Red Bull descended further into rancour as Lewis Hamilton won the Saudi Arabian GP with Max Verstappen a penalised second. Hamilton also scored a point for fastest lap, enabling him to pull alongside Verstappen in the championship standings.
The stage was set when Max locked his leftfront wheel under braking into the last corner on his final Q3 run, smacking his right-rear into the barrier at the exit. The physical damage was minor – no need for a second new gearbox of the weekend – but the botched lap put him third on the grid, behind Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas, when he had been easily quick enough for pole position. That enabled the Mercedes duo to control the start and pull away into a commanding 1-2.
At this point Verstappen seemed to have no answer to Mercedes’ race pace, which might have informed Red Bull’s gamble on not bringing him in when the Safety Car was deployed at the end of lap nine. Max was furious when Bottas backed him up behind the Safety Car, enabling Mercedes to double-stack in the pits, but this was rendered moot by the red flag which enabled Max to take the restart from pole – and with a fresh set of hard-compound tyres.
Verstappen raged again as Hamilton was slow to the grid at the restart, causing the
Red Bull’s tyres to lose temperature, and sure enough Hamilton made the better getaway – only for Max to hang it out around the outside into Turn 1, run off, then rejoin in Hamilton’s path. The Merc was forced to check up, enabling Esteban Ocon to sneak past.
Another stoppage ensued after Charles Leclerc and Sergio Pérez collided, causing Nikita Mazepin to run into the back of George Russell, and the horse trading kicked off behind the scenes as race director Michael Masi proposed to the Red Bull and Mercedes team managers that Ocon would restart from pole, with Hamilton second and Verstappen third – else Max’s conduct at Turn 1 would be referred to the stewards.
Verstappen took the second restart on medium tyres and forcefully passed Hamilton and Ocon at Turn 1 – but Hamilton eventually closed in. At the start of lap 37 Lewis swept by on the pit straight but Max stubbornly clung to the inside line, briefly going sideways mid-corner as momentum took them both across the run-off.
Masi ordered Red Bull to give up the position and the team directed Verstappen to do so “strategically”, ie in the DRS detection zone at the end of the lap, giving him the best opportunity to retake the lead immediately. But Hamilton hadn’t been informed of the race director’s call.
As Max slowed sharply through Turns 25 and 26 Lewis hit the back of him, dislodging a front wing endplate. Max eventually handed the position back but would later incur the wrath of the stewards, picking up separate five- and 10-second penalties.
“I’ve come across a lot of different characters and there’s a few at the top which are over the limit,” reflected Hamilton. “Rules kind of don’t apply, or they don’t think of the rules. He is over the limit for sure.”
2
Red-flag tyre-change rules under scrutiny
The rule which enables drivers to change tyres when a race is suspended has come under fire after several compeitors were inconvenienced by the first red flag. Lando Norris, who scraped back into the points in 10th after taking the final restart at the tail of the field, described the rule as “stupid”.
When the Safety Car was deployed in response to Mick Schumacher spinning his Haas into the barriers at Turn 22, Norris was one of several drivers to head for the pits – a logical strategic decision given the race was anticipated to be a one-stop affair. But after five laps behind the Safety Car the race was red-flagged, in effect giving a free stop to those who had chosen not to pit.
This had the effect of rearranging the order up front, enabling Verstappen to leapfrog Hamilton and Bottas, who had stopped. For Leclerc and Pérez it resulted in minor track-position losses (fourth to sixth and fifth to eighth), but for Norris it was hugely costly – Norris went from sixth to 14th. Hamilton complained over the team radio and Norris also spoke out after the race.
“It’s happened a few times, like obviously at Monza last year, you just get a free pitstop and it ruined our race,” said Norris. “I think they should change it to one mandatory pitstop with two different tyre sets needed to be used, and then I think that’s acceptable. But this just ruins everything, to be honest. You put so much effort in for it to be taken away for some stupid rule.”
3
Drivers unhappy with ‘unnecessarily dangerous’ Jeddah track
The new Jeddah Corniche circuit received what might diplomatically be described as a mixed response over a weekend punctuated by incidents. Sunday’s F2 feature race was red-flagged twice and a result declared after five laps following two major incidents. And even before the inaugural Saudi Arabian Grand Prix was interrupted by two red flags and several full-course yellows, Sergio Pérez described the venue as “unnecessarily dangerous”.
Those sentiments were later echoed by George Russell, who was rear-ended into retirement by Nikita Mazepin shortly after the first restart.
“It seemed pretty inevitable,” Russell told
GP Racing’s sister title Autosport. “You go around a Turn 2 that’s fairly wide and open – cars can go side by side – and then it really funnels in.
“There are unnecessary incidents waiting to happen in all of these small kinks that are blind, which are not even corners in an F1 car.”