2022 Emilia Romagna GP: Post Race Analysis
The first sprint race weekend of the season and I still heavily disapprove of the sprint race. The sprint race now gives points to the top 8, so it can be quite impactful during the season.
Red Bull had a dream weekend. They brought some small upgrades and high downforce wing package and it seems that was enough to elevate them to being the clear fastest car around Imola. Verstappen dominated with a "pole", sprint race win, Grand Prix win, and fastest lap. Perez a step behind his teammate, but still managed to gather a huge bundle of points which is massive for the constructors championship.
McLaren gets a lucky podium with Lando, but still a very very good result for the team. I would not expect them to be battling for podiums at many races just yet, as even when Norris was cleanly in 4th position, his pace was miles off of the likes of Ferrari and Red Bull. Ricciardo another dreadful race. Had potential for solid points, but it all dissolved in turn 2 with his collision with Sainz. Track position is very important as he had zero level recovery drive afterwards.
Mercedes once again getting a spoon full of good luck. Russell with another race finishing several positions above where he rightfully should be. But credit to him for being there to capitalize. Lewis Hamilton honestly benefited from much of the same good luck with Alonso and Sainz both DNF'ing. Leave it to Nico Rosberg to ensure everyone knows he just did a bad job in comparison to his teammate. Track position proved very important, but Lewis really only tried the exact same thing lap after lap in an attempt to get by the much slower Gasly. Hearing the boss man Toto Wolff coddling Lewis after the race over the radio was a bit cringe since we all saw Russell finish 4th, keeping a fastest Bottas behind despite not getting his preferred front wing set up for the dry conditions.
Alfa Romeo enjoying a strong car and a 5th place is a great result. Hard to say if Bottas' slow pitstop would have changed his result any, but surely it would have gave him better tires to fight the Mercedes at the end, and I think everyone that was not a Mercedes fan was hoping he would pass his former team. I guess Zhou finished 15th, who knows since I don't think I even saw him once on the TV broadcast.
Ferrari. OUCH. It was tough one for the home team favorites. Both Charles and Carlos have made very costly mistakes in the past, and those tendencies are still a problem. I don't blame Sainz for his race DNF, that was just a racing incident and some bad luck. His mistake in Friday's quali was on him though. Leclerc had a solid 3rd place in the bag, which is as good as he could have done, but badly over-drove the car into an embarrassing mistake that easily could have ended his race. The Sky Sport team suggesting his late pitstop was a mistake is nonsense. Leclerc was struggling, his tires were shot, there was no harm in pitting and seeing what happens, and it did put him back in the fight for 2nd. I don't think it ever was an attempt at fastest lap since Ferrari surely would know Red Bull would pit as well. I was baffled why Ferrari immediately pitted the car for a front wing change for just a damaged end plate. This feels like a mistake as it seems very possible that Charles could have finished 4th if he had stayed out. Who knows though.
AlphaTauri still have not figured out there car and perhaps the bottom half of the grid is where they belong. Tsunoda had one of his best drives of his career. Was under a lot of pressure all race and never cracked. Typically gets slaughtered by his teammate Gasly, who instead could only get stuck behind a Williams and fended off a 7 time champ. Technically Imola is the proper home race to AlphaTauri, even more so than Ferrari, so the team should be pleased with that 7th place finish.
Aston Martin getting points is a huge result. Vettel drove a really strong race. In the past Vettel was a savage in these conditions, so perhaps it is no surprised he had a very good race. Even Stroll managed to get into the top 10 and he also had one of the more dicey moments of the race while braking in the wet side of the track while on slicks. Tip your cap to boys under the helmets considering their car is still pretty lousy.
Haas had a tough race to say the least. It really seemed like the car was setup for 1 lap pace over race pace as the car just fell off badly as the laps went on. This meant the driver's were on the defense nearly the whole race. At least Magnusson was who still managed to score points. Meanly Mick Schumacher looked like a second rate pay driver out there and could barely get out of his own way. He needs to improve fast, or his seat could be and should be in jeopardy.
Williams just missing out on points once again. Albon another very very good drive. Drove as fast as the car could go, no mistakes, clean racing, great defending, handled the pressure. Didn't get enough credit for his performance today. Latifi drove as good as he usually drives, so lets move on.
Alpine I suppose had the most miserable time. Ocon never showed any pace this weekend, compounded by a penalty that really made no difference. Alonso however might have had something to battle for points, but his race was destroyed by Schumacher in lap 2. They really are having a hard season so far. Any opportunity of a good result gets squashed by some unfortunate circumstance. I feel their window for good results is closing, as the development race is likely going to leave them behind.
Driver of the Race: Max Verstappen. Pure domination. Was the class of the field by some margin all weekend.
On a side note. Whoever the TV director for this race was needs to get fired. There was so many battles or interesting moments happening and the director would not lets us see it happen. We did however get to see Lewis Hamilton follow Gasly for 25 laps or so. We could see from the scoring tab close battles happening, or the commentators talking about passes being made, yet we never got to see it happen. Very frustrating.
