The Emilia Romagna GP this year saw the return of passionate Tifosi encompass the track in a sea of red. With Ferrari on top of the driver’s and constructor’s championship, the home ground support was bigger than ever. And the pressure was on, for the prancing horse to match expectations. Even with Red Bull right on their tail. Who have brought significant weight saving upgrades to a risky sprint race weekend. Where teams only get one practice session before Parc Ferme.
Free Practice 1
1st and only practice of the weekend before cars are locked in Parc Ferme was off to a soaking start. FP1 here was the first-time fans and teams were able to see how these new cars performed in the wet. On top of this teams like Red Bull and Mercedes who opted to bring upgrades to their car had their work cut out for them. As drivers got a feel for driving the car in real wet weather for the first time, driving across the gravel, cutting chicanes and spinning was frequent throughout the session. The teams scrambled to complete their programs, collect data, and perfect their setup for the rest of the weekend.
Qualifying
Q1 & 2
Only a few minutes into Q1 Albon’s misfortune strikes again. This time his brakes overheat, tubing burns off the car and a mini explosion occurs at the back right. For the second time in a row Alex starts at the back and red flags the session due to debris. After the green flag soon after, we saw Lewis escape Q1 by the skin of his teeth. Out qualifying Yuki by 0.004s which saw home team Alpha Tauri, whose factory is closest to the track out in Q1 with Gasly in P17.
The first half of Q2 like Q1 was dry up until Sainz’s crash at Rivazza during his second continuous push lap. He later explained that he wasn’t expecting that crash or the car to move that way as he wasn’t pushing hard, which was certainly bizarre. Furthermore, before the crash Mercedes Russel and Hamilton were P11 and P13 respectively. And rain had arrived on track by the time the red flag was cleared. Making this the first time since Japan 2012 where both Mercedes cars haven’t reached Q3.
Q3
Kevin in his Haas was the first one to bring out the red flag in Q3 but managed to keep the car running and returned to the pits. With around 3 minutes left in the session, Leclerc in P1 and Max only 0.02s behind, Max had to slow down in sector 3 due to a stopped Alpha Romeo of Bottas and still took P1 by 0.779s before the red flag was brought out. And the order since didn’t change due to Lando bringing out yet another red flag with 38s remaining to allow Max to take pole from Leclerc in P2 and Lando himself to take P3.
FP2 & Sprint Race
Saturday was kicked off by an uneventful FP2 session, given Qualifying was already behind them. The sprint race followed it and picked up where quali left off with Leclerc passing Max at the start and with Perez and Sainz flying through the field. Lap 2 came around and Zhou crashed into Pierre taking himself out and leaving the Alpha Tauri with a puncture.
The safety car was brought out to clear Zhou’s car and ended swiftly on lap 5. After which Perez and Sainz got to work clearing everyone but their teammates upfront. And claimed P3 and P4 respectively by lap 14. Sainz outbroke anyone and everyone into turn 1. While Perez, well he didn’t need to with his Red Bull blasting past before the turn with DRS.
A brilliant pass by Max on Lap 20 to take the lead from Charles and the Red Bulls finished 1 – 3. With the Ferraris settling for a 2 – 4 finish.
Race Day
Expectations were high for today as the cars lined up for the formation lap on Inters for the wet track. Lights went out and the Red Bulls flew off the line with Max keeping P1 and Checo taking P2. Everyone got through turn 1 only for Ricciardo to slide into Sainz taking the Ferrari out twice in 2 races and sending the McLaren to the back of the field. And Mick spinning into Alonso damaging the Alpine’s sidepod leading to its retirement later on in the race.
Lewis was stuck in the back behind none other than Pierre for most of the race, while Max lapped Hamilton and Tsunoda on the other hand had a few brilliant overtakes to put him in P7, Bottas had a brilliant race in P6, P5 and almost overtook George for P4 near the end of the race – only if he had a lap or 2 more. And Red Bull took a 1 – 2 finish after a disappointing Australian GP for Max. McLaren meanwhile took home a surprise podium finish with Lando.
Some Drama
Oh yeah, and I almost forgot, Charles Leclerc after running P3 for most of the race aggressive attacked the sausage curbs at the Variante Alta on lap 53 to get DRS on Checo only to spin out, hit the wall, pit for a new front wing and ended up P7 at the checkered flag.
