Sauber has revealed a dramatic livery on its C44 at a launch event in London.
The Swiss-based outfit are no longer Alfa Romeo so the team has been rebranded as Stake F1 team with Stake as the main title sponsor. The flo-green and black look is certainly different and dramatic.
The C44 will then perform a shakedown run by Valtteri Bottas and Zhou Guanyu in a filming day in Barcelona followed by pre-season testing in Bahrain.
This new car is the first to be developed with the input of technical director James Key. It features what the team calls an “aggressively redesigned” aerodynamic package and a switch from a push-rod to a pull-rod front suspension – a configuration used previously by Red Bull and McLaren, which is primarily intended to create an aero benefit.
Team representative Alessandro Alunni Bravi has said the new green look is part of a conscious effort to embrace change after the Alfa Romeo years and with the team building towards Audi’s entry.
“There’s a new identity for our team, as we enter as Stake F1 Team,” said the Italian. “We saw a lot of changes, which makes this such an exciting era for us.
“This partnership will help us reach a new audience and expand our fan base. It also gives us a way to have a fresh and innovative approach in the way we communicate.
“There are changes in other areas. We are developing our team structure, strengthening our personnel, and this implies work is ongoing in Hinwil in all areas. It’s a new exciting era for our team.”
It’s definitely an exciting era for Stake before the Audi transformation two years from now. Let’s see if the car and team is competitive.
Williams have shown off their 2024 livery with a special launch event in New York. The FW46 has a tweaked black and blue look compared to last year’s car.
There is a thin strip around the nose and sidepods, which ‘represents the team’s British identity and its heritage to the previous Williams cars, including the 1985 FW10 as driven by Nigel Mansell and Jacques Villeneuve’s championhip-winning 1997 FW19.
Alongside its existing partners, Japanese manufacturing giant Komatsu has joined the team this season, featuring on the sidepods of its updated livery after signing a multi-year deal.
“It is a significant milestone to unveil the 2024 livery at an iconic location in New York City,” said team principal James Vowles.
“The FW46 has been the focus of the team for many months and there is still a tremendous effort going in from everyone at Grove to deliver our challenger for this year.
“As we look to build on the momentum from last season, we have a driver line-up in Alex and Logan that is capable of consistently fighting for points while helping lead our development for the future.”
The new darker colour look seems nice and yet lets see how competitive this car will be in the upcoming season. Best wishes to Williams.
Haas F1 Team have revealed their 2024 car via digital rendering and it features an evolution of their traditional black, red and white livery.
The proper VF-24 will perform a shakedown run later this month at Silverstone, before heading off to Bahrain for the pre-season test in preparation for the upcoming Formula 1 championship.
This will be their first season in Formula 1 without Netflix’s Drive to Survive star Guenther Steiner at the top, with Ayao Komatsu stepping up from his engineering leadership role to take over the team manager role.
“I’m looking forward to seeing the VF-24 running and racing – a sentiment,” said team owner Gene Haas. “I know I share with our partners and indeed the entire team.
“In Nico Hulkenberg and Kevin Magnussen, we also know we’ve got a great pair of drivers behind the wheel, their experience will prove invaluable again as we develop our program through the year. We’ve used the off-season to put the processes in place to be better and ultimately improve our overall performance. Soon we get to see how we’re doing.”
Komatsu added: “We’re realistic about our expectations for the VF-24 to start but it’s still an exciting moment in any Formula 1 season to showcase the car.
“There’s a lot of work ahead of us to make progress and increase our performance but everyone here is highly motivated and eager to get on track with the VF-24.
“I know we’ll be maximizing our time in Bahrain with all the various items we need to push through. Bottom line, we can’t wait to get going and get the season underway.”
It will be interesting if the change in leadership can help Haas move up the pecking order in this sport. Last year, the team finished last in the constructors’ standings.
Hopefully Kevin Magnussen and Nico Huldenberg will have a better car to score points as last year’s VF-23 had tyre management issues caused by the aerodynamics. Best of luck to Haas in this upcoming season.
This is a major surprise in the world of Formula 1. The seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton is leaving Mercedes and will race for Ferrari in 2025, partnering Charles Leclerc at the Scuderia.
After many success at Mercedes including winning the drivers’ title for the outfit six times between the years 2014 to 2020, Lewis is seeking a new challenge after two frustrating seasons with the Brackley-based outfit.
Hamilton hasn’t won a race since 2021 and the Mercedes car’s lack of performance recently may have convince him to jump to a different team to continue his winning form.
It will be fascinating if he can finally achieve his eighth championship to become the most successful Formula 1 driver in the history of the sport. To team up with Charles Leclerc is going to thrilling as both are fast and determine.
The upcoming Formula 1 season is expected to be Hamilton’s last with Mercedes. He joined the outfit in 2013 after starting his career at McLaren six years earlier. Having won the 2008 world title with McLaren, Hamilton’s move to Mercedes made him the most successful Formula 1 driver of all time with more than 100 pole positions, 103 Grand Prix victories and seven championships.
However, since the new technical regulations introduced in 2022 Lewis has yet to win a race in the past two seasons. The lack of competitiveness could be the factor in deciding a move to a different team.
As for Ferrari, the team haven’t achieved title success since Kimi Raikkonen last won the championship back in 2007 so for Lewis Hamilton to take the title for the Scuderia would be an incredible achievement.
In addition, Ferrari seemed to be the closest challenger to Red Bull with Carlos Sainz winning in last year’s Singapore Grand Prix the most recent triumph.
On the subject of Carlos Sainz, it will be sad to see the popular driver leave in 2025. It will be interesting where he would go to make way for Hamilton. Hopefully a competitive seat.
Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc as Ferrari teammates in 2025? Sounds incredible and I look forward to the on-track battles. Bring it on!
McLaren become the first Formula 1 team to reveal their 2024 look by showing of the livery design for the upcoming championship season.
It features more papaya, which has been a staple of the colour scheme since the 2018 season in referring to their early cars, compared to last year’s livery.
The 2024 challenger will be named the MCL38 and is due to break cover on February 14, when the team complete a shakedown run at Silverstone. It will then head to Bahrain for pre-season testing, which begins on February 21.
The team will run an unchanged line-up of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, with Team Principal Andrea Stella set for his second season in charge.
“We’re delighted to launch our 2024 Formula 1 livery ahead of the new season,” said McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown. “The design looks awesome, and I can’t wait to go racing and see it come to life on track next month.
“We didn’t start 2023 as we wanted but Andrea and the team did a great job following the organisational restructure coming into action, and the hard work continues as we carry that excellent momentum into the 2024 campaign.
“I’m confident the exciting pairing of Lando and Oscar will continue to create more mega memories together after such an impressive second half of last year, which saw the team finish fourth in the championship with 302 points. These are all steps forward from the year before as we continue our mission to push and compete at the front of the grid.”
Stella added: “After a busy and productive off season, we head into 2024 with our sights set on continuing our journey towards the front of the grid. Last year allowed the team to set a strong foundation for the future through continued hard work, commitment, effort and talent.
“With our new infrastructure upgrades and people in place, we must continue to elevate our standards and incorporate high performance in everything we do.
“The 2024 livery looks great and I’m looking forward to seeing our exciting driver line-up of Lando and Oscar take the MCL38 to track next month.”
The new paint job certainly looks good and compared to last year’s car, more cleaner design in terms of livery. Hopefully the new MCL38 can regularly score points and Lando Norris will finally win his first race.
Three-time world champion Max Verstappen signs off his successful championship with victory at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. He finished ahead of Charles Leclerc and George Russell.
At the start, Leclerc made a better getaway than polesitter Verstappen and was fully alongside the outside of the Red Bull at the first corner, but the world champion swept around the Ferrari to maintain the lead.
The same thing played out at Turn 5 at the end of the Yas Marina track’s long back straight before a third time Leclerc was able to move within Verstappen but had to move to the outside of the Turn 9 hairpin at the end of the second long acceleration zone.
Verstappen then dropped Leclerc by enough to move out of DRS threat, which left the Ferrari under more pressure from the battling McLaren pair behind.
Initially, Oscar Piastri headed Lando Norris – the McLaren driver having jumped George Russell through the race’s opening corners – before Norris moved ahead on lap four of 58.
A long DRS train ran back from the leaders through the early laps, before gaps began to appear as Leclerc pegged Verstappen’s lead around the 1.5 second-mark and Piastri fell back from Norris.
As the lap count moved into double figures, Norris could not match the pace at the front in the mid-one minute, 30 seconds, with Leclerc still just over a second behind Verstappen as they nursed the medium tyres they had all started on through the opening stint in what was a thermal degradation, tyre management affair.
Although Verstappen complained his front tyres were “getting hurt a bit”, it was Leclerc who fell back as the pitstops approached – kicked off for the frontrunners when Piastri, Norris and Russell stopped on laps 13 and 14.
Verstappen came in at the end of lap 16 with a 2.0 seconds lead to switch to hards, which was nearly doubled thanks to the undercut’s power when Leclerc rejoined on the same compound one tour later.
Ferrari initially had to be more concerned about Russell’s threat on warmed hards after he had jumped Norris in the pits thanks to a slow left-rear change on the McLaren having got ahead of Piastri shortly before the stops.
But Leclerc was soon pulling clear and the leaders made their way through the cars that had yet to stop after starting on the hards, including Carlos Sainz, who offered no defence when Verstappen came up behind him with DRS down the back straight.
By lap 23 Verstappen was back at the front after AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda had been the last medium-starter to pit and led for a chunk, with Verstappen’s lead at this stage over Leclerc now up to 4.5 seconds.
This reached 6.4 seconds by the start of lap 30, with Russell still keeping Leclerc honest under two seconds behind in third, with Verstappen alone able to regularly lap in the low one minute, 29 seconds now on the more durable compound of the two main race tyres.
At the front, as night rolled in over Yas Island, little happened beyond Verstappen extending his lead over eight seconds before Norris stopping at the end of lap 33 for more hards.
Russell and then Leclerc stopped over the subsequent two laps to avoid being undercut, while Red Bull left Verstappen out along with Perez.
He had carved his way up from starting ninth to running just behind Norris before the McLaren came in for a second time, with Perez eventually coming in at the end of lap 42 and rejoining a net fifth and three seconds behind Norris.
Verstappen, who had instructed Red Bull to consider pitting his teammate first, duly came in one lap later – his lead now the two-stop strategy had played out down to 5.5 seconds but the world champion instead gaining a bit tyre-life offset to Leclerc.
He brought this to bear immediately in his third stint – pulling away with a fastest lap in the high one minute, 26 seconds and then a string of times in the one minute, 27 seconds that Leclerc could not match.
Verstappen’s final winning margin was 17.9 seconds and in controlling this event as he did, he achieved over 1,000 laps led in 2023.
Perez was the main focus of the final stint as he battled Norris – but in controversial circumstances, as they collided at Turn 6 on lap 47 in what was a low-speed clash well away from the apex where each driver blamed the other.
The next time by at the same spot, Perez got Norris to move up to fourth, but Checo was soon handed a five-second time addition for causing the clash in the eyes’ of the stewards.
But an intriguing off-track controversy was also brewing by this stage, as first Lewis Hamilton then Pierre Gasly in the pack behind were announced as being under investigation for an infringement at their final stops.
An FIA spokesperson announced this related to mechanics possibly not wearing required eye protection during the services, with Verstappen, Logan Sargeant and Zhou Guanyu also facing similar investigations post-race.
As the closing stages commenced, Perez closed up to Russell’s rear and passed him with a DRS-assisted dive to Turn 9’s inside on lap 54.
Perez then shot after Leclerc but with Russell able to stay just close enough behind, Leclerc’s late decision to try and boost a driver he knew would fall back once the chequered flag fell by pulling over ahead of the Turn 5 chicane and then chasing Perez home ended up being a complicated tactic that did not come off.
In the end, Russell being boosted back to third by Perez’s penalty meant Mercedes ended three points ahead of Ferrari in the constructors’ standings, with the latter’s tactic of leaving Sainz out on effective one-stopper hoping for a late safety car backfiring when this did not appear.
After a last-gasp stop for softs, Sainz was retired in the pits in a race where all the other cars went the full distance bar the lapped Valtteri Bottas and Kevin Magnussen right at the back.
So not the most thrilling race at Yas Marina and yet in terms of victories, Max Verstappen ended his championship-winning season by coming first. Charles Leclerc finished in second while George Russell took third and that was enough for the Mercedes team to take the runners up place in the constructors’ standings.
Hopefully next year, we will have closer competition as Red Bull and Max Verstappen dominated with so much success.
Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, race results: 1 Max Verstappen Red Bull 1:27:02.624 2 Charles Leclerc Ferrari +17.993s 3 George Russell Mercedes +20.328s 4 Sergio Perez Red Bull +21.453s 5 Lando Norris McLaren +24.284s 6 Oscar Piastri McLaren +31.487s 7 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin +39.512s 8 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri +43.088s 9 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes +44.424s 10 Lance Stroll Aston Martin +55.632s 11 Daniel Ricciardo AlphaTauri +56.229s 12 Esteban Ocon Alpine +66.373s 13 Pierre Gasly Alpine +70.360s 14 Alexander Albon Williams +73.184s 15 Nico Hulkenberg Haas +83.696s 16 Logan Sargeant Williams +87.791s 17 Zhou Guanyu Alfa Romeo +89.422s 18 Carlos Sainz Ferrari DNF 19 Valtteri Bottas Alfa Romeo +1 lap 20 Kevin Magnussen Haas +1 lap
Three-time world champion Max Verstappen signed off his qualifying performance this season by taking his usual spot – pole position. The Red Bull driver finished ahead of Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc and McLaren driver Oscar Piastri.
In a final qualifying session where the soft tyres were good for just a single flying lap – unlike the multiple fliers seen in Las Vegas – Lewis Hamilton was knocked out in Q2 for Mercedes while Carlos Sainz suffered from traffic to get eliminated in Q1.
In Q3, Verstappen put in time of one minute, 23.445 seconds on his first of two runs, with the 2023 title winner well clear of the rest at this stage as he was the only one to use new tyres.
On the second runs, Verstappen ran at the rear of the group of leaders to this point, but was unable to improve his time.
The others did, but not by enough, with Charles Leclerc going from just over a second off after the first Q3 runs to shoot up to second on his final attempt – ending up 0.139 seconds to the Red Bull driver.
Piastri took third ahead of George Russell, who climbed the order with Q3’s quickest time in the final sector to rise to fourth position.
Lando Norris had looked like Verstappen’s biggest challenger but he made a mistake with the new tyres right at the end due to a massive sideways moment at Turn 13 which cost the McLaren driver 0.4 seconds in the lap’s final third sector alone.
Then came Yuki Tsunoda, Fernando Alonso and Nico Hulkenberg, while Pierre Gasly rounded out the top ten.
Sergio Perez’s final lap was good enough for sixth but he lost it for running too wide out of Turn 1, where he had had a wild sideways moment on the first Q3 attempts. So time was deleted and will start in P9 instead.
Verstappen progressed Q2 with just a single run on new softs, while the rest took a sighter on used softs at the start of the middle segment.
Come the end with everybody bar Verstappen out on new softs, Russell’s improvement eliminated his Mercedes teammate Hamilton, who complained on his way back to the pits, “There’s something wrong with this car”.
Then came Esteban Ocon, Lance Stroll, Alex Albon and Daniel Ricciardo, with Albon having run off-set for his second run and completed his final flier well ahead of the rest – just as Williams had done at the end of the opening segment.
In Q1, where the entire field was covered by one-second, Perez’s last-gasp effort moved him through in second behind Verstappen, knocking out Carlos Sainz along with Kevin Magnussen, Valtteri Bottas, Zhou Guanyu and Logan Sargeant.
The first four completed personal best efforts on their second and final fliers, with Sainz complaining about traffic impacting his last run, but Sargeant lost both his Q1 times for running beyond track limits at Turn 1.
His best of those two laps was his first, but that still would not have been fast enough to progress.
So congratulations to Max Verstappen in taking pole at Yas Marina. Earlier, the Red Bull driver was struggling to find a right setup after a tricky final practice session. But the team figured it out and the world champion delivered the result with P1. Kudos.
Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, qualifying positions: 1 Max Verstappen Red Bull 1:23.445 2 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 1:23.584 3 Oscar Piastri McLaren 1:23.782 4 George Russell Mercedes 1:23.788 5 Lando Norris McLaren 1:23.816 6 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri 1:23.968 7 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin 1:24.084 8 Nico Hulkenberg Haas 1:24.108 9 Sergio Perez Red Bull 1:24.171 10 Pierre Gasly Alpine 1:24.548 11 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:24.359 12 Esteban Ocon Alpine 1:24.391 13 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 1:24.422 14 Alexander Albon Williams 1:24.439 15 Daniel Ricciardo AlphaTauri 1:24.442 16 Carlos Sainz Ferrari 1:24.738 17 Kevin Magnussen Haas 1:24.764 18 Valtteri Bottas Alfa Romeo 1:24.788 19 Zhou Guanyu Alfa Romeo 1:25.159 20 Logan Sargeant Williams No time
Red Bull’s Max Verstappen brushed off the time penalty and car damage to score big at Sin City – winning the Las Vegas Grand Prix from Charles Leclerc, who passed Sergio Perez on the final lap.
Verstappen overcame a five-second time penalty for clashing with Leclerc on the first lap and had to drive around with front wing damage picked up in another incident with Mercedes driver George Russell.
Leclerc showed Ferrari’s race pace potential was true, but was ultimately undone by the second of two safety cars losing a tyre advantage he had over Verstappen and with the caution period it helped Perez recover from picking up front wing damage in a Turn 1 chaos.
At the start, polesitter Leclerc found Verstappen quickly alongside him but when they arrived at the Turn 1 hairpin the Red Bull ran the Ferrari to the edge of the track and off, each soon arguing that they had their front axles ahead at the apex per the racing rules of engagement since early 2022.
In the pack behind, Fernando Alonso spun solo on the low-grip surface and got hit by Valtteri Bottas, who in turn was struck by Perez, with Carlos Sainz understeering into Lewis Hamilton.
The ensuing debris left behind meant the virtual safety car was activated at the end of lap one of 50, with Verstappen already over a second clear anyway.
His gap was up to 1.6 seconds when the race went back to green flag racing conditions at the start of lap three, which did not last long as Lando Norris – having made good gains in the early chaos from his lowly grid spot – crashed hard at Turn 12.
He had actually lost the rear of his McLaren following teammate Oscar Piastri in the previous corner and when things snapped suddenly sideways Norris could not catch it back up again on the slippery surface and he slammed rearwards into the Turn 11 exit wall and then shot down the track to the barriers well behind Turn 12 – nearly collecting Piastri as he did so.
The safety car was called out as Norris climbed out of his broken car, with the caution period lasting until the start of lap seven.
Verstappen was already out of DRS threat by this point as he had dropped Leclerc just before Turn 14 at the end of the long Strip straight, then braked for the right-hander, which Leclerc called “dangerous”.
At the start of lap nine when Verstappen’s lead had reached 2.0 seconds with his pace in the early laps, the race stewards determined he was at fault for the Turn 1 incident with Leclerc and handed him a five-second penalty.
Red Bull told the world champion to concentrate on extending his gap to above the penalty duration before his first pitstop, to which he replied his team could, “give them [the stewards] my regards”.
But Leclerc pressed on reducing the gap to the leader and reversing any gains Verstappen made.
Approaching lap 16, Verstappen’s pace dropped as his tyres degraded, which meant Leclerc got DRS on the following tour and used it to pass Verstappen into Turn 14 – just after Red Bull had told its charge he would be pitting.
Verstappen came in and served his penalty before switching the mediums he and Leclerc had started on for hards – the whole service lasting 7.7 seconds and with Verstappen rejoining back in the pack and even behind Russell, who had stopped a few laps earlier.
Ferrari initially left Leclerc out to build a gap while Verstappen lost more time fighting slower rivals and getting through the hard tyre’s tricky warm-up phase before Leclerc finally pitted at the end of lap 21.
He rejoined in third position – behind Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll and Perez, who had both gained stopping after the lap one chaos and early safety car.
Leclerc took a few laps to make sure he did not overstress his new hards – fitted at a pitstop that ran at least a second long due to a slow right front change – then he charged down and passed Stroll into Turn 14 on lap 25.
A little further behind, Verstappen and Russell, who had both been making progress in the pack back towards their previous positions, clashed when Verstappen dived to the inside of Turn 13 and Russell turned in.
The contact smashed Verstappen’s right front endplate and Russell’s left-hand side, with the debris left on the track requiring another safety car to clear up.
Red Bull pitted to net leader Perez and Verstappen for more hards, while Leclerc was left out again and his previous tyre off-set was gone at that moment.
When the race restarted on lap 29 – just before which Russell was handed a five-second penalty for the Verstappen contact – Leclerc dropped Perez nicely but was soon under pressure.
As Verstappen worked his way by Pierre Gasly and another second safety car non-stopper Piastri, Perez closed in and passed Leclerc for the lead into Turn 14 on lap 32 after initially unable to get by the Ferrari with DRS the first time.
But Leclerc was able to stay with Perez even as Verstappen roared up behind him – the Ferrari driver attacking at Turn 14 and surprising Perez to retake the lead on lap 35 at Turn 14.
Verstappen then demoted his teammate at the same place on the following lap, then immediately on lap 37 he retook the lead with a DRS blast down the Strip and then sealed the position at Turn 14’s apex after Leclerc had come off the brakes and tried to make a fight of it.
Leclerc again initially stayed with Verstappen, with Red Bull urging the leader to find a way to break the tow to his pursuer, with Perez unable to pass Leclerc again despite his tyre advantage thanks to the Ferrari’s smaller, lower-downforce rear wing.
Verstappen’s superior pace in the low-one minute, 36 seconds did get him clear of immediate threat from Leclerc as the race entered its final laps, before on lap 43 Leclerc outbraked himself at Turn 13 and went very deep.
Perez shot through and from there the top three ran Verstappen shot clear, with Leclerc re-catching Perez and pursuing the Red Bull over the final laps.
On the last lap, with Verstappen having dropped back from a nearly five-second advantage to just over two to try and help Perez with a long-distance slipstream at Red Bull’s request, Leclerc made a surprise dive at Turn 14.
He got alongside Perez late and stole second at the apex, then defended from Perez coming back at the final corner, ending up 2.0 seconds behind Verstappen.
Russell charged back to fourth on the road with a series of late passes – including a move into Turn 14 on Esteban Ocon on the last lap – but his penalty dropped him to eighth in the final results.
Ocon, who had battled by teammate Gasly a few laps after the second safety car in a tough but fair intra-Alpine scrap, therefore got fourth back, with Stroll fading only to fifth after his earlier gains – the Aston Martin driver like Perez also making use of a stop under the second safety car.
Sainz recovered from his Turn 1 contact, damage and first stop under the VSC to finish sixth, with Hamilton ending seventh having had a bruising race that included contact with Piastri in the midfield action just before the first round of pitstops.
Alonso also battled back to finish ninth on an effective one-stopper after his lap-one incident and pitstop later on that tour, while Piastri came home in the final points-paying position.
He dropped back from his late high position behind the leaders as he was on a two-stopper and did not gain from stopping under either safety car, while Gasly dropped back himself as he appeared to not be able to make the one-stopper work as well as Ocon.
Yuki Tsunoda and Nico Hulkenberg were late non-finishers as they both pulled off in the Turn 14 runoff with technical problems in the closing laps.
So after all the pre-race hype leading up to this event, the actual racing at Las Vegas was quite good. The DRS on the Strip provided the most action and entertainment. So good job Sin City.
Congratulations to Max Verstappen in winning the race despite penalty and damage to his car. He was so fast and fight through to take another victory. As for Charles Leclerc, was a shame not to finish first but his final lap overtake was spectacular. Sergio Perez might have lost out on P2 in the end but he finished second in the drivers’ championship so that is a solid result.
Las Vegas Grand Prix, race results: 1 Max Verstappen Red Bull 1:29:08.289 2 Charles Leclerc Ferrari +2.070s 3 Sergio Perez Red Bull +2.241s 4 Esteban Ocon Alpine +18.665s 5 Lance Stroll Aston Martin +20.067s 6 Carlos Sainz Ferrari +20.834s 7 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes +21.755s 8 George Russell Mercedes +23.091s 9 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin +25.964s 10 Oscar Piastri McLaren +29.496s 11 Pierre Gasly Alpine +34.270s 12 Alexander Albon Williams +43.398s 13 Kevin Magnussen Haas +44.825s 14 Daniel Ricciardo AlphaTauri +48.525s 15 Zhou Guanyu Alfa Romeo +50.1620 16 Logan Sargeant Williams +50.882s 17 Valtteri Bottas Alfa Romeo +85.350s 18 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri DNF 19 Nico Hulkenberg Haas DNF Lando Norris McLaren DNF
Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc scored big at Sin City by taking pole position for the Las Vegas Grand Prix, edging out his teammate Carlos Sainz and two-time world champion Max Verstappen.
Leclerc led all three segments of qualifying, which featured Lewis Hamilton, Sergio Perez and both McLarens being knocked out≠.
In the first two segments, the cars completed multiple runs on the same set of softs to build temperature and gain grip on the slippery, and cold track surface, but in Q3 the frontrunners completed typical single-lap efforts.
After Leclerc had established provisional pole with a time of one minute, 33.021 seconds first lap in Q3, Sainz went in a different direction with two warm-up laps for his second go, which meant Leclerc and Verstappen would set their laps ahead of him even as they left the pits late on to try and catch the best of the dramatic track evolution factor here.
But the one-lap efforts did not produce the usual excitement as the tyres did not fire up – as widely expected – with Leclerc able to improve best being slower than his personal best in sector one and Verstappen aborting his second Q3 attempt as he was unable to gain any time in the opening two sectors.
Leclerc stayed on it and eventually found enough tyre temperature to improve to a one minute, 32.726 seconds, which was still barely quicker than he went in Q2.
Sainz’s alternative approach also paid off as he went faster and maintained the second position he had taken on the first Q3 attempts, but he will drop to P12 for the race as a result of his controversial penalty for taking a new battery following his FP1 water valve cover strike.
Behind Verstappen, efforts coming in during Q3’s final moments put Pierre Gasly and Williams pair Alex Albon and Logan Sargeant into sixth and seventh – Gasly and Albon unable to displace George Russell from fourth after he had completed his final Q3 run just ahead of them.
Valtteri Bottas took eighth ahead of Kevin Magnussen and Fernando Alonso.
In Q2, which the Ferrari drivers started on used softs before switching to a fresh tyres, while Verstappen waited to just complete a later stint on new softs, ended with late improvements for Albon and Gasly knocking out Hamilton.
These gains also eliminated Sergio Perez, the Red Bull having been wheeled back into its garage with over two minutes of the session remaining and Perez already sitting down in sixth and with just a 0.4 seconds margin to P11.
Also knocked out in Q2 were Nico Hulkenberg, Lance Stroll and Daniel Ricciardo.
In Q1, Stroll’s last-gasp improvement knocked out Lando Norris in P16, ahead of Esteban Ocon, Zhou Guanyu, Oscar Piastri and AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda.
Stroll faces a post-qualifying investigation for possibly failing to slow under yellow flags brought out to cover Tsunoda’s Turn 5 off late in Q1, with the Aston Martin driver already set to drop five positions for the race overtaking under yellows in FP3.
Hamilton, Russell, Albon, Zhou, Gasly and Bottas also have to explain to the stewards why they were clocked going too slowly at stages in Q1 – part of the attempt brought in since Monza to reduce traffic issues in qualifying but has typically always ended with drivers in question only being handed warnings.
So congratulations to Charles Leclerc on scoring big at Las Vegas with this pole. The Ferrari looked quick around the street circuit. Lets see if Charles can win a race on Sunday.
Las Vegas Grand Prix, qualifying positions: 1 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 1:32.726 2 Max Verstappen Red Bull 1:33.104 3 George Russell Mercedes 1:33.112 4 Pierre Gasly Alpine 1:33.239 5 Alexander Albon Williams 1:33.323 6 Logan Sargeant Williams 1:33.513 7 Valtteri Bottas Alfa Romeo 1:33.525 8 Kevin Magnussen Haas 1:33.537 9 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin 1:33.555 10 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:33.837 11 Sergio Perez Red Bull 1:33.855 12 Carlos Sainz Ferrari 1:32.770* 13 Nico Hulkenberg Haas 1:33.979 14 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 1:34.504 15 Daniel Ricciardo AlphaTauri 1:34.308 16 Lando Norris McLaren 1:34.703 17 Esteban Ocon Alpine 1:34.834 18 Zhou Guanyu Alfa Romeo 1:34.849 19 Oscar Piastri McLaren 1:34.850 20 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri 1:36.447 *Ten-place grid penalty for battery change
Red Bull Racing’s Max Verstappen achieved his 17th win of the 2023 Formula 1 season with victory at Interlagos, beating Lando Norris’s early challenge for the lead.
The triple world champion had been able to successfully convert pole position into a win to double up on his sprint race triumph from Saturday, fending off Norris once again in an initially close-fought contest that eventually led to the two drivers diverging.
Verstappen was barely troubled beyond the opening ten laps and, despite a Norris fightback towards the end as the McLaren driver had opted for a strategy offset in the final stint, had enough in hand to cross the finish line with an 8.2 seconds advantage.
Although Norris was only sixth on the grid, the McLaren driver moved into contention with two key moments on either side of the start: first, Charles Leclerc had suffered a hydraulic issue on the formation lap and hit the wall at Ferradura, which ended his race before it had even begun.
This opened up a grid space on the front row, which Norris moved into as the slow-starting Fernando Alonso ahead offered a prime opportunity to break down the inside into the first corner and collect second, as Lewis Hamilton rounded both Aston Martins on the outside to slot in behind.
The race was red-flagged thanks to a crash between Alex Albon and Kevin Magnussen at the first corner, and Norris crucially held off Hamilton at the restart to ensure he retained second place.
Norris began to put Verstappen under scrutiny over the next three tours and harried him on the eighth lap, when he attempted to prise open a gap on the outside of the first corner.
He followed that up with a look at Turn 4, but this was countered by Verstappen and the McLaren driver subsequently had to back off having taken a big chunk of life out of his tyres.
The gap between the leaders soon opened to over two seconds as Norris struggled to get back on level terms, with the arrears continuing to increase as Verstappen had the pace advantage.
Both drivers pitted on lap 27 with their delta now at 3.6 seconds, but Norris lost a second through his spell in the pitlane to add to Verstappen’s buffer.
Norris kept Verstappen in check over the middle stint, initially keeping the gap at around five seconds, but after half distance, the difference between the two cars became more apparent and Verstappen was approximately eight seconds to the good when he stopped on lap 56 for a second time.
After pitting three laps later, Norris was 14 seconds behind as Verstappen benefitted from the undercut, but the McLaren driver reduced away the lead and managed it down to just over eight seconds by the chequered flag.
Alonso beat Sergio Perez to third place having come under sustained pressure from the Red Bull in the final stint for a podium position, overturning a penultimate-lap overtake on the final lap and crossing the line with just 0.053 seconds in hand.
The Aston Martin driver had kept ahead of Perez over the previous two stints with apparent ease, but it was Checo who had the greater speed on the soft tyres at the end.
Alonso was forced into taking a series of different lines to keep Perez from gaining the better traction through Turn 8 and Turn 13, and managed to resist despite the threat of DRS.
But Perez managed to collect himself and powered through into the first corner on lap 70, and held off any threat through the Turn 4 braking zone at the bottom of the hill.
To respond, Alonso stayed on Perez’s gearbox throughout the rest of the lap and used the start-finish straight to draw close, capping off the overtake with a last-lap pass around the outside at Turn 4. Despite Perez’s greater pace with DRS at the very end, Alonso had just enough to complete the top three.
Lance Stroll managed his best finish since the Australian Grand Prix to take fifth position as Aston Martin appeared to be in much stronger form over the Brazil weekend, as Carlos Sainz overcame late-race downshift issues to complete the top six.
Sainz had been able to work his way past the Mercedes pair on his way to sixth and, thanks to Leclerc’s failure to start the race, was the only remaining Ferrari over the Grand Prix.
The Ferrari driver was six seconds clear of an impressive Pierre Gasly, who had to deal with braking worries on his route to seventh having been upwardly mobile throughout the opening half of the race.
Lewis Hamilton’s eighth-place finish summed up a disappointing weekend for Mercedes as a high-drag car and inability to find a competitive method of managing tyres left to a drop through the order.
He had been fighting with teammate George Russell for most of the race, but last year’s winner was called in to retire with rising oil tempertunes.
Yuki Tsunoda claimed ninth position, while Esteban Ocon made a three-stop strategy work to claim the final point available.
Logan Sargeant finished ahead of Nico Hulkenberg outside of the points, as Daniel Ricciardo and Oscar Piastri spent effectively the whole race a lap down after being caught up in the start incident between Albon and Magnussen.
Albon’s rear-left was clipped by Nico Hulkenberg’s front wing as the field compressed into the first corner, which pitched the Williams into Magnussen’s flank.
The incident caused rear wing damage to both Piastri and Ricciardo; Piastri was hit by Magnussen, while the loose tyre liberated from Albon’s car in the clash hit Ricciardo’s rear wing. Both were set to retire, but the red flag offered the respective teams the opportunity to fix the issues.
So congratulations to Max Verstappen in winning the Brazil Grand Prix race. This was an impressive drive in the Red Bull.
Brazil Grand Prix, race results: 1 Max Verstappen Red Bull 1:26:07.136 2 Lando Norris McLaren +8.277s 3 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin +34.155s 4 Sergio Perez Red Bull +34.208s 5 Lance Stroll Aston Martin +40.845s 6 Carlos Sainz Ferrari +50.188s 7 Pierre Gasly Alpine +56.093s 8 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes +62.859s 9 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri +69.880s 10 Esteban Ocon Alpine +1 lap 11 Logan Sargeant Williams +1 lap 12 Nico Hulkenberg Haas +1 lap 13 Daniel Ricciardo AlphaTauri +1 lap 14 Oscar Piastri McLaren +2 laps George Russell Mercedes DNF Valtteri Bottas Alfa Romeo DNF Zhou Guanyu Alfa Romeo DNF Charles Leclerc Ferrari DNF Kevin Magnussen Haas DNF Alexander Albon Williams DNF
