The 2021 Formula 1 season is turning out to be more action packed than anyone could have hoped for and we can’t have enough of it! Max Verstappen and Red Bull have really brought the competition to the reigning seven-time World Champions; Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team. Max won the race last week in Austria and we are racing there again this weekend.
Currently, the 23-year old Dutchman has an 18-point lead in the Drivers’ Standings and he has placed first or second in every race except Baku because of the tyre failure. Red Bull has been on a winning streak for the last four races and are 40 points clear of their rivals. Verstappen has delivered a stellar performance this season and seems to have way more experience than his age would suggest, and with the help of Perez who is looking very good in the second seat at Red Bull, Max only looks better. The excellent driver pair-up allows the team to use better strategies in the races.
Tensions are picking up in the Mercedes’ garage. Having said that, I wouldn't write off the German team so easily. If there is any team in the paddock that can step up and meet their competition head-on, we know it's Mercedes. We have to keep in mind that in 2017, Sebastian Vettel in the Ferrari had a 25-point lead and in 2018 he had a 17-point lead on Hamilton. He managed to turn it around by the end of the season.
Despite how much Hamilton has said in the media that Red Bull has a better package, upgrades and how strong they look, Toto Wolf, their team principal confirmed at the end of last weekend that there will be no upgrade packages for the Mercedes-AMG car, claiming that they can’t put all their eggs in one basket especially with the budget cap and the completely new rules for next year. It seems now though that they might have been playing mind games because it turns out they did go ahead and make changes to the car. Maybe they were just looking to throw their rivals off…maybe it worked… we can’t wait to find out.
Last week on the Austrian track, we witnessed the heartbreaking race of George Russel whose brilliant performance in the Williams was cut short because of a reliability issue with the engine. He was looking excellent, quick and was on track to earn four points for the team which would have moved him from 17th to 15th in the Drivers’ Standings and his team Williams from 9th place in the Constructor’s Standings to 8th, beating Alfa Romeo. However, all hope is not lost as we are racing on the same track again this weekend and we can expect the Williams driver to do well and find redemption from a disappointing race-weekend.
When discussing the 2021 season, how can we not talk about Lando Norris? The 21 year old British driver has proved to be the Mr. Consistent of the 2021 season so far. He has ended every race in the top 5 this season with the exception of Spain. He has already bagged 2 podium places in the 8 races so far and if all that fails to impress you, he is currently on a 13-race points scoring streak which is the longest record for any Mclaren driver since Fernando Alonso in 2007(14 races) and the current longest for any driver on the grid for this year. He has even managed to beat his highly-rated and far more experienced teammate Daniel Ricciardo. Norris is currently 4th in the Drivers’ Standing, surpassing even Valtteri Bottas in the Mercedes.
Daniel Ricciardo is currently the most talked about driver among those that have made a switch this year. Sainz in Ferrari, Perez in Red Bull and Vettel in Aston Martin all seem to have gotten comfortable in their new cars and are doing well. In fact, each of them have scored podiums and Perez has even won a race. Things started to look good for the driver in France where teammate Lando and him scored a 5-6 finish but even with the great start he had last week, Daniel had to give back all the places that he made up in the first lap, because of the temporary engine failure. Ricciardo entered this triple header with the hope that three consecutive races would give him the mindset that he needs to catch up to speed. Nevertheless, don’t lose hope Danny Ric fans! He too, like Russel, can find redemption this coming weekend.
There was a lot of talk about the Driver of the Day; Charles Leclerc. Some felt that after the lap-1 incident where he caused Gasly race to come to an end, and collaterally caused minor crashes for Latifi and Giovinazzi, Sainz was the more deserving candidate for the title. Even though Leclerc had a great recovery drive, one of his career-best, many argued that he should never have been in a position to recover in the first place.
Carlos Saiz meanwhile, who hadn't had a great qualifying, had a great clean drive and made up places from P-12 to be in the position to fight Norris for P-5. He had much better pace and a fresh set of tyres to take Norris on, but was stuck in an unfortunate position where he got lapped by Lewis Hamilton who was on old tyres and held Sainz back for 15 laps. By the time he was able to unlap himself, it was too late for him to catch upto P-5. Regardless, both Ferrari Drivers showed excellent pace on the Austrian track and will definitely do everything to score points to catch upto Mclaren this Sunday.
The on-coming weekend marks the end of the first triple-header this season. We will once again race in Austria at the Red Bull ring and are hoping for a suspenseful and thrilling race. There are so many battles to watch out for. Red Bull and Mercedes at each other’s tails. Mclaren and Ferrari are fighting for P-3 in the Constructors Championship with just a 12-point gap between them: the former in the lead at present. Keep an eye out for an Alpha Tauri and Aston Martin tussle with just 2 points separating them. There is even a healthy battle in the back with the two Haas drivers; young Schumacker and Mazepin, both the rookies fighting it out on track. We can’t say for sure what will go down on the track come Sunday but what we can say with confidence is that there will be a lot to watch out for and the motorsports world is revving to find out, so let’s get racing. Lights out and away we go!
