This weekend is full of adrenaline not only because we have four three days of Formula 1 with free practice on Friday, Qualifying on Saturday and then Race day on Sunday. There are also some other events like UFC 285 on Saturday and Futbol on Sunday Barcelona vs Valencia.
I recently a few post on what to expect from season 2023 and what was season 2022 for me
F1 World Championship 2023 Season about to start - What to expect
@skiptvads/f1-world-championship-2023-season
Drive to Survive Season 5 - Is it good? - Personal Opinion
@skiptvads/drive-to-survive-season-5
This season is comes with a lot of excitement since there are new drivers, new regulations and for the first time the cars from 2022 will be improve after their first season, cars were change last year with the new regulation.
From the hand of Fernando Alonso now with his new team Aston Martin, they mad the fastest legal time yesterday on free practice consider that on 2022 Charles Leclerc from Ferrari did Pole with a time of 1:30:55 meaning that even if Aston Martin was on full throttle they are competitive and that's a HUGE difference with all caps than last year, I was eager to make a post about practices but I think it would be misleading for those who only see the races, practice is just that nothing else, usually cars go from 3 to 5 seconds faster on qualifying, its a very very little group of people who watches all three days of the event.
Small recap and opinion of what happen today during qualification.
There are three sessions of Qualification, Q1 the first 15 of 20 drivers qualify.
On Q1 after started there was a small incident with Ferrari who lost part of the front left wheel cover causing a red flag, as you can see on the images above his car start loosing pieces of his front wheel cover/wing that then were in the track and had to be clean up, this is nothing mayor, this happens every now and then, it also happen early on the race, they took the Ferrari back in the garage and have it fix. Everyone goes out to the track with five minutes left to go, Q1 very uneventful, no spins, no crash, just Ferrari that lost a chunk of the car but that was it.
Surprise surprise, Im not a fan of any specific brand or driver, I have my preferences for all most all teams.
Red Bull - Sergio Perez
Ferrari - Carlos Sainz
Mercedes - Lewis Hamilton
Aston Martin - Fernando Alonso
Alfa Romeo - Valteri Bottas
The rest of the teams really dont care that much but there still a few things I will be following through the season for example Oscar Piastri who is suppose to be prodigy didnt perform the best on his first Quali but thats ok since he doesnt have too much seat time on the Mclaren, I just hope its not another Daniel Richardo all over again since the situation is similar although Daniel is a well known Grand Prix winner.
This is how Q1 end full of surprises
1- Carlos Sainz, the moment this guy gets a proper reliable car you will see him fighting for Pole very often, this is my favorite driver from Ferrari, different than Leclerc its my opinion he has more balls to show up and do the things that are necessary in track to be aggressive and go for the win without hesitating.
2- George Russel, from Mercedes end up second, everyone knows Mercedes was sandbagging during practices, they always try to show up as the underdog but I know how good he is after last season and its clear that Mercedes had enough to compete on Q1.
3- Charlse Leclerc, from Ferrari, this is no surprise since Ferrari last season had the fastest car from day one and he is a good driver, mostly they suffer last season from reliability issues.
The surprise of Q1 was Aston Martin, I knew Fernando would do good but they also got Lance Stroll between the first 10, its not very often that you see this happen but the rumor is that they have a very competitive car for this year and we will find out at the end of this qualification session, on track its more driver than the car. I also ENJOY that Fernando is DESTROYING Alpine and Ocon because of all the BULL SHT he had to take form them, lets see how it goes on Q2, I cant take out of the equation Red Bull since the are the have the Driver and Constructor Championship for last year.
Teams get more performance out of the cars as they move to next Quali session, this is turning to be an outstanding session, Mclaren Team Boss Zak Brown mentions that he doesnt remember the last time qualification was so tight, less than half a second between top seven drivers, we dont only have the constant big three, Red Bull, Ferrari and Mercedes on top, we now have other teams that can give you real surprises.
For Q2 I was expecting Lando Noris from Mclaren to make the top 10 but now with Lance Stroll, who I think can do a bit better since he is driving with an almost broken wrist from a mountain bike accident week before Bahrain, and Hulkenberg its hard to make it, the top 10 is very competitive so far, I don't see Red Bull dominating as in the last 17 races then won last year and would like someone else than Leclerc to get Pole since this guy last year was not able to capitalize all the poles he got so it was basically lot of excitement thrown to the trash every time he wins a pole to then loose the race.
Hulkenberg is a driver with lots of experience how is now back for the third time into a car as first driver, HAAS use Ferrari parts and their car last year was competitive but drivers not so much, him running so close to Sergio Perez could be indication of at least them getting into the middle of the grid and stay there with one or both of their drivers. Just to mention his relationship with Kevin Magnussen is not the best, this two are frienemys almost hate each other so hope that doesn't become a problem for the team.
Red Bull brings it home with a one two, Max Verstappen the fastest man on the track with Sergio Perez on second with a very small difference, there is some bad blood between them from last season, on Brazil Max denied the position to Sergio while he was already champion and Sergio was fighting for second place in the championship, Max is a great driver probably one of the best of this decade but I don't share how the went against his partner when Sergio on 2021 help him many times even on the last race was Sergio who hold Hamilton for him, that's the past lets see what happens tomorrow.
Ferrari retire Leclerc ealry, after the race he got interview and mention its not for technical issues is just that their time was ok for them and getting more out of the car probably was not possible at the time.
This will be a very interesting race with teams like Aston Martin and HAAS who were most of the time never in the top 10 of the grid, I also have expectations on what will Lewis Hamilton will do for this season since after he lost on 2021 to Max he haven't had so much success and even getting beat by his new teammate last season.
Qualifying Recap by WTF1 Youtube Channel, they usually have more in signs and commentators are not dramatic as others, they stick to racing.