Formula 1 returns to Europe for a string of races across circuits that drivers and teams are all deeply familiar with.
To start, the sport travels to Austria and the Red Bull Ring in what is likely to be a happy homecoming for the Red Bull team who continue to dominate the sport.It is also the second sprint race weekend of the 2023 season as well as marking an unwelcome milestone for Ferrari. Here are the Talking Points for the Austrian Grand Prix.
Ferrari’s year without wins
Just 15 months ago, Ferrari ended their longest losing streak of the 21st century with a strong victory for Charles Leclerc in Bahrain to enter into Formula 1’s new ground-effect era in the best way possible.
Two rounds later, Leclerc was on top of the podium again in Melbourne. It seemed as though Ferrari were destined to challenge for that year’s championship against Red Bull and firmly re-establish themselves as regular contenders for race wins. After two full seasons without winning.
But Ferrari only won twice more after that race in Melbourne – a breakthrough triumph for Carlos Sainz Jnr at Silverstone, followed immediately by a third win of the season for Leclerc at the Red Bull Ring, where F1 returns this weekend. Of the 19 grands prix held since the last time teams arrived in Austria, Mercedes have won one – Red Bull, the other 18.
“We could show a bit more of our true pace,” Sainz said after crossing the line in Montreal. “I think it would have been a nice fight up there between three different manufacturers.”
Heading to the circuit where they last tasted victory almost a year ago, Ferrari need a clean weekend to show just how quick they truly are.
Sprint sequel
As it was back in 2022, the Austrian Grand Prix will be a sprint race weekend. The second of six rounds run with the divisive format in 2023, this weekend will follow the revised format used for the first time at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix earlier this year.
That means the grid for Sunday’s grand prix will be decided by a qualifying session on Friday afternoon. Saturday is all about the sprint event, which has its own qualifying session in the morning and a 100 kilometre race later that day.
While he won the sprint race and secured pole position for the following day’s grand prix, Verstappen was unable to convert it into victory as he was out-paced by Leclerc throughout the race as overtaken three times to eventually finish second. But with the new format for this year, everything that happens on Saturday will have no impact on Sunday.
Flaws in the new format became apparent during its Baku debut. In particular the rules make it possible for a driver to reach Q3 yet not have any tyres available to participate in it, as was the case for Lando Norris and Yuki Tsunoda at that race. It remains to be seen whether that rule will be tweaked in time for this weekend.
The other key difference to last year concerns the availability of DRS, which drivers can use on the first lap after a start or restart in sprint races, instead of two laps later as in the grand prix.
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Will Perez’s podium drought go on?
While Verstappen continues to enjoy seemingly endless success out front, his Red Bull team mate Sergio Perez has endured a frustrating three rounds. Failing to reach the podium in either Monaco, Spain or Canada, he has seen his deficit in the drivers’ championship to Verstappen balloon from six points to 69.
Perez has two chances to break his unwelcome streak of early qualifying eliminations this weekend in Austria. With two qualifying sessions back-to-back between Friday night and Saturday morning, Perez has to hope he will manage to make it through to the top ten shootout this weekend. But he also has just one practice session to work on the braking problems he revealed he is being troubled by.
He was lucky to qualify as well as he did at this track last season. Despite reaching Q3, Perez should never have been there at all. He participated in Q3 and took fourth on the grid at first, but then after qualifying his fastest Q2 time was deleted by the stewards after they determined he had exceeded track limits, with his second-best time only good enough for 13th place. As he never should have been in Q3 to begin with, all his times from the final phase were annulled. That was no consolation to Pierre Gasly, who missed out on his rightful place in Q3 as a result.
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Keep within the lines
When former FIA race director Michael Masi was axed as F1 race director before the start of the 2022 season, his replacements – Niels Wittich and Eduardo Freitas – both installed a new zero-tolerance policy to track limits. Whereas Masi had applied track limits rules on a circuit-by-circuit basis, outlining ahead of each weekend how the rules would be applied at various corners, the new approach was to define track limits by the white lines, full stop.
During the race, four drivers – Norris, Gasly, Sebastian Vettel and Zhou Guanyu – received five-second time penalties for exceeding track limits four times. Three others – Hamilton, Sainz and Perez – were shown the black-and-white flag as an official warning for running outside of the confines of the track three times.
So far in 2023, not a single driver has received an in-race penalty for exceeding track limits four times. However, there have been instances of drivers having times deleted during qualifying for breaching the track. This weekend, drivers will have to stay disciplined throughout the 71 laps of the grand prix to avoid falling foul of the race director.
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New budget cap row brewing?
It emerged last week the FIA has recently advised teams of a key clarification in how it will define ‘non F1 activities’ which are exempt from the budget cap. This is potentially a significant development, as several teams have technology arms which harness their F1 knowhow for applications outside the sport, and concerns have been raised about how easily information could flow between the two.
What isn’t clear yet is whether the FIA’s revision is aimed at the behaviour of any particular team or teams during and may presage a new row over the policing of the Financial Regulations. Last year Red Bull were found to have exceeded the spending limit by £1.8 million during 2021, while two other teams were found to have made procedural errors in complying with cap.
While teams have largely heaped praise on the Financial Regulations for reigning their spending in, it is proving tricky to enforce.
Crowd control
After the first day of competition on Friday, some fans attending the race reported they had experienced harassment from fellow ticket holders at the event, including instances of sexual harassment, homophobia and racial slurs. There were reports by one female fan that a group of men lifted her skirt and abused her for supporting Lewis Hamilton, while RaceFans spoke to one fan who described how she was sexually harassed while attempting to enjoy the racing in the grandstands.
The reports were met by universal condemnation from those in the sport, including Verstappen and Hamilton along with many others. Team principals Christian Horner and Toto Wolff also both denounced the reported harassment, while the Austrian Grand Prix promoters deployed additional stewards and security to try and dissuade further incidents.
The incidents left a stain on the weekend for many fans who had travelled to the Red Bull Ring rightly expecting to be able to enjoy watching the sport free from such ugly behaviour. There will be zero excuses and likely zero tolerance if anything of the like happens again this weekend.
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Are you going to the Austrian Grand Prix?
If you’re heading to Austria for this weekend’s race, we want to hear from you:
Who do you think will be the team to beat in the Austrian Grand Prix? Have your say below.
And don’t forget to enter your predictions for this weekend’s race. You can edit your predictions until the start of qualifying:
2023 Austrian Grand Prix
- Mercedes left scratching heads by lack of performance at Austrian GP
- Verstappen’s determination to grab every point makes him a record-breaker
- Austrian GP track limits farce was avoidable like ‘IndyGate’ and Spa 2021 – Brown
- Alpine now “definitely beatable” for McLaren after upgrade – Brown
- Paddock Diary: 2023 Austrian Grand Prix
Todfod (@todfod)
27th June 2023, 8:05
Don’t think there’s much hope for Ferrari in Austria. They can’t seem to get things right in Quali.. and their race pace and tyre management is probably weaker than the top 3 teams as well. If Leclerc can pull off some heroics in quali by putting it on pole, he might be able to sneak in a P3 result. There’s no way they can finish any higher though.
playstation361
27th June 2023, 13:16
Things are not up to the mark right now. We may see sudden freshness at some point of time for Ferrari to overcome their situation.
Jere (@jerejj)
27th June 2023, 14:08
Ferrari’s year without wins – Which will probably only continue further.
Sprint sequel – Yes, & hopefully, a decently exciting Sprint race, unlike in Baku, although I’m skeptical. I doubt anything will change about the loophole concerning Norris-Tsunoda in time, but DRS availability a lap earlier (which wasn’t the case yet in Baku, iirc) for selected Sprints this season is something I’m skeptical about, but perhaps my slight worry will prove pointless in the end.
Will Perez’s podium drought go on? – I’d like to think no, given the car he drives, but as he failed to reach top 3 in Montreal despite a decently overtaking-friendly circuit on paper (largely because of DRS train proving surprisingly effective there this year), I’m doubtful about next weekend unless he qualifies within 2nd or within the top 5 at least because the DRS train effect could be even greater at Red Bull Ring.
Keep within the lines – Yes, nothing new in this regard, although to be precise, the corner-by-corner basis was originally Charlie’s approach with Masi merely continuing on where he left in the 2018 Abu Dhabi GP & every qualifying session this season, afair, has had lap time invalidations, although most of these were for slow laps, flying laps abandoned after an off-track excursion, or for off-track excursion at places where going off is automatically slower because of gravel or something else. Nevertheless, drivers need to be careful, especially at the last two corners that have always been problematic for track limits.
New budget cap row brewing? – Maybe, but hopefully, nothing massively problematic.
Crowd control – Definitely needed for everyone’s safety & enjoyment.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
27th June 2023, 20:29
Yes, don’t think ferrari will win this year, aston and mercedes are there in case something happens to red bull. Unless leclerc is on top form and ferrar is relatively decent and something happens to verstappen all in the same race.
Bonbonjai
28th June 2023, 12:52
Based on peformances this year, if Max and Red Bulll hit trouble Aston Martin, Mercedes or Ferrari (in that order) are most likely to pick up the pieces. As for now all our hopes of anyone other that red bull winning all the reaces this season rest on them. Based on race pace and quali at the moment red bull are out of reach.