ALFAS STAR IN CONGESTED MIDFIELD

Alfa Romeo drivers Valtteri Bottas and debutant Zhou Guanyu recovered from shaky first laps to land only the fourth double points finish for the former Sauber team since its Italian rebranding in 2019.

Bottas, who made his 102nd consecutive Q3 appearance to qualify sixth, was hampered off the line by excess wheelspin and then kept it cautious for the remainder of the opening lap to fall to 14th. But potent race pace combined with a wellexecuted three-stop strategy meant he recovered to where he’d started in his first race since leaving Mercedes.

Zhou, meanwhile, initially fell from 15th to last after triggering anti-stall as the field bunched up into Turn 1 and he bogged down in second gear. But he fought back to bag the final point in 10th.

An elated Zhou said: “I am so happy, I am speechless. My biggest dream was to race in

F1, then to score points and tonight we did both.”

Team principal Frederic Vasseur didn’t mind the wasteful starts as they proved “an even more promising sign as we were able to mount a comeback, which means our car is genuinely competitive”.

Splitting the Alfas were Esteban Ocon, Yuki Tsunoda and Fernando Alonso. The Alphatuari driver found 1.6 seconds on lap 40 of 57 to relieve Alonso of what would become eighth with the aid of DRS on the main straight.