The variables which could decide a close Styrian GP qualifying session

2021 Styrian GP Friday practice analysis

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Qualifying for the Styrian Grand Prix looks set to be very close, and not just because the Red Bull Ring has the shortest lap time of the year.

While Red Bull look like the team to beat, there isn’t much in it, and there’s no shortage of variables which could influence the all-important contest for pole position.

Formula 1 may have dodged the expected rain on Friday but other series sharing the same track did not. Heavy rain remains possible throughout Saturday afternoon’s running: The official weather forecast indicates a 60% chance of rain through final practice and qualifying (and the W Series race afterwards, for that matter).

Even if the skies don’t open, however, there’s plenty more that could happen.

Mercedes vs Red Bull

Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes, Red Bull Ring, 2021
Track limits cost Hamilton his quickest lap time
Lewis Hamilton, Max Verstappen and Valtteri Bottas all had lap times deleted during practice sessions for exceeding track limits, along with several of their rivals. Hamilton and Verstappen lost some of their better times from the session. In second practice, Hamilton would have been much closer to Verstappen’s time than he ended up, if he’d kept it within the limits – his disqualified time was a 1’05.335, fractionally quicker than Verstappen’s best.

So although Red Bull and Verstappen confidently topped both practice sessions, it’s too early to discount the Mercedes drivers. And as Hamilton acknowledged yesterday, Mercedes tend to perform less well in qualifying these days relative to the grand prix.

“I don’t know if we definitely have better race pace,” he said. “I think we’re very close, we’re probably stronger [in the race] than we are compared to qualifying.

“In the last race, we were losing three and a half tenths just in the straights, with engine power or drag, probably a combination of the two. And it’s tyres, it’s the fact that we lost a lot of downforce this year.”

Slipstreams and yellow flags

The last sector is no place to get close to another car
Since the current generation of high-drag Formula 1 cars arrived, the Red Bull Ring has been among the tracks where drivers stand to benefit significantly if they can get a tow from a rival over the course of its three long straights. A well-timed tow in Q3 could give us a surprise pole-winner.

It’s a double-edged sword, however, as you don’t want to get too close to a rival through the quick corners in the final third of the lap. During second practice, Lando Norris was caught out by a car entering the pit lane ahead of him out of turn nine, understeered wide in the wash of the car ahead, and ran beyond the track limits.

Norris was one of the most prolific violators and will have to rein it in during qualifying or risk having a vital lap struck, as happened to him in Imola. He is handy around the track, however – remember the last-lap heroics which put him on the podium at this venue last year.

We’ve seen red flags disrupt qualifying sessions on several recent occasions. More of the same is possible tomorrow, as are yellow flags, given the vast expanses of gravel waiting to trap drivers. Hamilton lost a front-row start due to this last year, picking up a three-place grid penalty; team mate Bottas has already collected the same for his bizarre pit lane spin during practice.

Disguised pace

Pierre Gasly, AlphaTauri, Red Bull Ring, 2021
Rapid Gasly couldn’t show his speed in second practice
AlphaTauri showed strong pace in first practice, then fell back in the second, but don’t overlook the potential of the AT02s.

Jonathan Eddolls, AlphaTauri’s chief race engineer, confirmed that the team moved their second practice programme forward to the first session, expecting rain. Both drivers showed such strong pace in the morning, consistently among top five drivers, Pierre Gasly Gasly finishing the session second-fastest.

However Gasly was unable to complete any running during second practice as Honda were concerned about his power unit. The team also confirmed that Yuki Tsunoda’s qualifying simulation run was compromised, so his final time didn’t reflect their true pace.

Some teams seemed to take a significant step forward from morning to afternoon; most notably, McLaren improved considerably, Daniel Ricciardo finishing second-fastest.

Other teams might have done something different; Ferrari, in particular, had poor pace in second practice, both their factory team cars finishing behind Antonio Giovinazzi’s Alfa Romeo in the order and both outside the top 10. Given the team’s need to try and understand their Paul Ricard performance, it seems likely we haven’t seen their real pace this weekend so far.

Equally, Alpine look very fast. Their cars were the clear best-of-the-rest after second practice but that was also true on Friday at Paul Ricard. By qualifying, they failed to get both cars into Q3 and struggled with race pace.

Whatever teams are doing, expect it to remain fairly mysterious until qualifying itself. For the very tight midfield, third practice is unlikely to feature more qualifying simulation as, unlike in Paul Ricard, many of them are unlikely to be able to chance making Q3 on medium tyres.

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Combined practice times

PosDriverCarFP1FP2Total laps
1Max VerstappenRed Bull-Honda1’05.9101’05.41270
2Daniel RicciardoMcLaren-Mercedes1’06.6691’05.74871
3Esteban OconAlpine-Renault1’06.5511’05.79068
4Lewis HamiltonMercedes1’06.3321’05.79665
5Fernando AlonsoAlpine-Renault1’06.5191’05.82773
6Sebastian VettelAston Martin-Mercedes1’06.7081’05.93468
7Lando NorrisMcLaren-Mercedes1’06.8611’05.99473
8Lance StrollAston Martin-Mercedes1’06.5841’06.07968
9Sergio PerezRed Bull-Honda1’06.6961’06.08968
10Antonio GiovinazziAlfa Romeo-Ferrari1’06.6141’06.14564
11Carlos Sainz JnrFerrari1’06.6301’06.14770
12Pierre GaslyAlphaTauri-Honda1’06.16632
13Valtteri BottasMercedes1’06.3861’06.25164
14Charles LeclercFerrari1’06.6291’06.27074
15Kimi RaikkonenAlfa Romeo-Ferrari1’06.29740
16Yuki TsunodaAlphaTauri-Honda1’06.3971’06.45174
17George RussellWilliams-Mercedes1’06.8481’06.62870
18Mick SchumacherHaas-Ferrari1’07.4731’06.88658
19Nicholas LatifiWilliams-Mercedes1’07.1801’07.66962
20Nikita MazepinHaas-Ferrari1’08.0811’07.40460
21Robert KubicaAlfa Romeo-Ferrari1’07.82329

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Teams’ progress vs 2020

NB. The 2020 Austrian Grand Prix has been used as the point of comparison as the same tyre selection was used for that race.

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Author information

Hazel Southwell
Hazel is a motorsport and automotive journalist with a particular interest in hybrid systems, electrification, batteries and new fuel technologies....
Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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3 comments on “The variables which could decide a close Styrian GP qualifying session”

  1. How was the long run pace among the top teams?

    1. @dmw – the Formula1 site has Red Bull just in front of Mercedes. Ferrari are 3rd fastest in terms of race pace but only 7th on qualy pace, so may see them advance in the race (if they can get through Turn 3 unscathed :-)

    2. @dmw we do long run pace for the pre-race analysis, as it’s not key to qualifying

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