Verstappen’s nearest challengers are focused on other rivals in finale

Formula 1 has never been the most popular market when it comes to sports betting.

After all, there are too many outcomes, too many variables that can come into play. Even when a driver is looking especially strong, all it takes is one misjudgement, one small piece of debris or a slight mechanical problem and an almost guaranteed victory suddenly devolves into no points.

But there’s been nothing as close to a sure bet in Formula 1 history perhaps like Max Verstappen and Red Bull in 2023. A total of 18 wins from 21 rounds – an unparalleled level of sustained victory over such a long calendar of racing.

Which is why it was so surprising to hear Red Bull team principal Christian Horner informing Verstappen after he had stormed to the final pole position of the 2023 season that team adviser Helmut Marko had lost €500 to him in a friendly wager by betting he would fail to qualify on the front row of the grid. After all, who would bet against Max Verstappen in 2023?

The reality is, heading into qualifying, there were valid reasons to be cautious about putting money on the world champion. After a disrupted Friday with only a limited level of running, Verstappen had complained about the balance of his car being anything but balanced. After an evening to go over the little data they had, Red Bull made changes to the car but the end result seemed the same.

However, come qualifying, whatever settings changes race engineer Gianpiero Lambiase and his team made to car number one did the trick. Verstappen found the balance he needed from his car and successfully took pole position with the first of his two attempts in Q3 to deny Charles Leclerc, Oscar Piastri and all other contenders who may have dared to dream of securing the top spot on the grid.

“It definitely shows that it’s details that can make a massive difference,” Verstappen said after qualifying. “Because today, I was not so happy up until qualifying and then in qualifying it turns into normal behaviour.”

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Now, Verstappen and Red Bull have the chance to finish off the single most successful season any team and driver have ever enjoyed in the history of the sport in the best fashion possible – by converting pole position into their 19th win of the season.

But it might not be quite as straightforward as it seems.

By Verstappen’s own admission, the lack of any meaningful long-run data generated in practice is going to leave him slightly in the dark as to how their car and tyres will perform over a long race stint on high fuel. While it’s easy to assume that he will simply control the race from the front as he has on so many occasions in 2023, Verstappen insists he has “no clue” how his car will go over the 58 laps of the race and that even the data the team have from last year’s race here will only have limited use.

“It will help a little bit,” Verstappen said. “But, of course, every year, your balance, or issues that you have to go faster, are a little bit different, so you can’t always relate fully to what you have done in the past. But it does help you understand a few things.”

Starting alongside him on the front row of the grid is Charles Leclerc, who has looked strong from the moment he first got strapped into his Ferrari for the second practice session after lending it to Robert Shwartzman early on Friday. While he couldn’t deny Verstappen pole position, Leclerc was sure he had maximised his car’s potential with second. But after fighting Verstappen for victory last weekend in Las Vegas, Leclerc does not expect to be able to push the Red Bull so hard on Sunday.

“On a track like this, with hot conditions like this, I expect us to struggle a bit more than Las Vegas on race pace,” Leclerc admitted. “But let’s see. In FP3, I had quite a good feeling during the race simulations, so I hope we can reproduce that tomorrow.”

But while Leclerc would love to end the year in the highest possible fashion by beating Verstappen and taking his first victory of 2023, there’s a bigger goal for he and Ferrari team mate Carlos Sainz Jnr.

“The only thing that matters to me is that we challenge the Mercedes and that we take the second place in the constructors’ championship,” Leclerc said. “So we just need to beat the Mercedes, but of course if there’s an opportunity to beat Max tomorrow, I’ll take it.”

Ferrari’s battle with Mercedes could well come down to Leclerc versus George Russell, who will line up directly behind him in fourth on the grid. Lewis Hamilton’s Q2 exit leaves him down in 11th on the grid, with Sainz even further back in 16th after a torrid weekend so far. But after setting the pace in two of the three practice sessions, Russell was left feeling that he could and should have managed better than fourth.

“That was a little disappointing,” he admitted. “I want to end the season on a high, so ultimately my goal is to be on the podium and get the most out of the points for the team in the constructors’ championship, so let’s see what tomorrow holds for us. Although Lewis had a tricky session today, I am sure he will move forward tomorrow.”

Hamilton himself insisted that his car was inconsistent almost on a corner-by-corner basis and offered little prediction for whether he would be able to make his way up into the top half of the top ten during the race. Starting down in 16th, Sainz was at least a little more hopeful of getting into the fight for points.

“The long runs haven’t looked bad,” Sainz said. “So we just know what we need to do tomorrow, which is a good recovery and see if we can get back in the points and score points and see where we might end up.”

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While Ferrari and Mercedes will be fighting the most meaningful battle on the track, McLaren will be hoping to upset the pair of them and return to being Red Bull’s closest rivals as they have been so many times in the latter part of the season. While Lando Norris looked like the biggest threat to Verstappen in the early phases of qualifying, a mistake at turn 14 for Norris ultimately cost him two positions on the grid and possibly a front row start.

After kicking himself for failing to make the most of his potential, Norris said he had “no idea” whether he could offer any stronger challenge in the race itself.

“I [only] did FP2, there was two red flags – I’ve not done more than one lap in a row this weekend,” he said. “I’ve not done one lap with more than 50 kilos of fuel, so I don’t know. It was a terrible day for me today, but the car’s been very good all weekend with the few laps I’ve done so. We’ll find out.”

Starting third, Oscar Piastri says he’s just as clueless as anyone about what to expect from the field during the final grand prix of the season.

“For everyone, I think it’s going to be the same story,” he said. “I think the most anyone’s done is probably five laps in a row this weekend. It’s going to be interested to see how everyone pans out tomorrow.”

But in much the same way Leclerc is eyeing the Mercedes, McLaren are preoccupied with another rival. They only scored two points in Las Vegas, which allowed Aston Martin to draw within 11 points of them, and a late slip on Sunday could cost them fourth in the championship.

With only a handful of teams having run anything like a meaningful long run in practice, strategy is going to be an educated guess at best. Last year, with the same suite of compounds, the vast majority of drivers started on the medium tyres but while most of the field ran a two stop strategy, the top two drivers – coincidentally Verstappen and Leclerc – were the only drivers in the top eight finishers who made just one stop, switching to the hards around lap 20.

Pirelli expect that to be the fastest approach to the race tomorrow, but a mid-race Safety Car or VSC could force many to switch onto a two-stop. Like last year, the soft compound is only expected to be considered in very rare situations.

Yas Marina’s long straights and hard braking zones are tailor-made for DRS passes, it does not seem worth going overly aggressive at the start of the race to get track position if you must then fight to try and keep rivals behind. But with Leclerc and Piastri behind him and Russell and Norris all looking to snatch a win at the final opportunity, Verstappen may have to look in his mirrors a little more than usual.

But even though the competition is sure to be fierce, it will take a brave person to bet against Verstappen adding a 19th win to close out 2023. Or maybe just Helmut Marko.

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Qualifying times in full

P.	Driver	Team	Q1	Q2 (v Q1)	Q3 (v Q2)
1	Max Verstappen	Red Bull	1’24.160	1’23.740 (-0.420s)	1’23.445 (-0.295s)
2	Charles Leclerc	Ferrari	1’24.459	1’23.969 (-0.490s)	1’23.584 (-0.385s)
3	Oscar Piastri	McLaren	1’24.487	1’24.278 (-0.209s)	1’23.782 (-0.496s)
4	George Russell	Mercedes	1’24.337	1’24.013 (-0.324s)	1’23.788 (-0.225s)
5	Lando Norris	McLaren	1’24.368	1’23.920 (-0.448s)	1’23.816 (-0.104s)
6	Yuki Tsunoda	AlphaTauri	1’24.286	1’24.207 (-0.079s)	1’23.968 (-0.239s)
7	Fernando Alonso	Aston Martin	1’24.501	1’24.131 (-0.370s)	1’24.084 (-0.047s)
8	Nico Hulkenberg	Haas	1’24.425	1’24.213 (-0.212s)	1’24.108 (-0.105s)
9	Sergio Perez	Red Bull	1’24.209	1’24.116 (-0.093s)	1’24.171 (+0.055s)
10	Pierre Gasly	Alpine	1’24.600	1’24.078 (-0.522s)	1’24.548 (+0.470s)
11	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1’24.437	1’24.359 (-0.078s)	Missed by 0.081s
12	Esteban Ocon	Alpine	1’24.565	1’24.391 (-0.174s)	Missed by 0.113s
13	Lance Stroll	Aston Martin	1’24.405	1’24.422 (+0.017s)	Missed by 0.144s
14	Alexander Albon	Williams	1’24.298	1’24.439 (+0.141s)	Missed by 0.161s
15	Daniel Ricciardo	AlphaTauri	1’24.461	1’24.442 (-0.019s)	Missed by 0.164s
16	Carlos Sainz Jnr	Ferrari	1’24.738	Missed by 0.138s
17	Kevin Magnussen	Haas	1’24.764	Missed by 0.164s
18	Valtteri Bottas	Alfa Romeo	1’24.788	Missed by 0.188s
19	Zhou Guanyu	Alfa Romeo	1’25.159	Missed by 0.559s
20	Logan Sargeant	Williams

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Sector times

P.	#	Driver	S1	S2	S3	Ultimate lap (deficit)
1	1	Max Verstappen	17.078 (2)	35.894 (1)	30.4 (3)	1’23.372 (+0.073)
2	16	Charles Leclerc	17.188 (10)	35.986 (2)	30.385 (2)	1’23.559 (+0.025)
3	4	Lando Norris	17.076 (1)	36.087 (3)	30.412 (4)	1’23.575 (+0.241)
4	63	George Russell	17.097 (3)	36.206 (9)	30.365 (1)	1’23.668 (+0.120)
5	81	Oscar Piastri	17.101 (4)	36.093 (5)	30.497 (5)	1’23.691 (+0.091)
6	11	Sergio Perez	17.144 (5)	36.206 (9)	30.518 (8)	1’23.868 (+0.248)
7	22	Yuki Tsunoda	17.222 (13)	36.131 (6)	30.569 (10)	1’23.922 (+0.046)
8	14	Fernando Alonso	17.157 (6)	36.31 (15)	30.546 (9)	1’24.013 (+0.071)
9	27	Nico Hulkenberg	17.243 (14)	36.26 (12)	30.514 (6)	1’24.017 (+0.091)
10	44	Lewis Hamilton	17.278 (15)	36.258 (11)	30.514 (6)	1’24.050 (+0.309)
11	10	Pierre Gasly	17.202 (12)	36.091 (4)	30.785 (12)	1’24.078
12	23	Alexander Albon	17.18 (8)	36.175 (7)	30.834 (16)	1’24.189 (+0.109)
13	18	Lance Stroll	17.182 (9)	36.277 (14)	30.809 (14)	1’24.268 (+0.137)
14	31	Esteban Ocon	17.197 (11)	36.26 (12)	30.923 (18)	1’24.380 (+0.011)
15	3	Daniel Ricciardo	17.305 (16)	36.399 (16)	30.69 (11)	1’24.394 (+0.048)
16	2	Logan Sargeant	17.177 (7)	36.185 (8)	31.17 (20)	1’24.532
17	55	Carlos Sainz Jnr	17.355 (19)	36.484 (18)	30.802 (13)	1’24.641 (+0.097)
18	20	Kevin Magnussen	17.326 (17)	36.424 (17)	30.993 (19)	1’24.743 (+0.021)
19	24	Zhou Guanyu	17.332 (18)	36.594 (20)	30.819 (15)	1’24.745 (+0.414)
20	77	Valtteri Bottas	17.401 (20)	36.54 (19)	30.847 (17)	1’24.788

Speed trap

P.	#	Driver	Car	Engine	Model	Max kph (mph)
1	23	Alexander Albon	Williams	Mercedes	FW45	333.6 (207.3)
2	11	Sergio Perez	Red Bull	Honda RBPT	RB19	332.8 (206.8)
3	1	Max Verstappen	Red Bull	Honda RBPT	RB19	331.7 (206.1)
4	2	Logan Sargeant	Williams	Mercedes	FW45	329.4 (204.7)
5	16	Charles Leclerc	Ferrari	Ferrari	SF-23	329.3 (204.6)
6	27	Nico Hulkenberg	Haas	Ferrari	VF-23	329.2 (204.6)
7	31	Esteban Ocon	Alpine	Renault	A523	328.9 (204.4)
8	20	Kevin Magnussen	Haas	Ferrari	VF-23	328.2 (203.9)
9	55	Carlos Sainz Jnr	Ferrari	Ferrari	SF-23	328.2 (203.9)
10	77	Valtteri Bottas	Alfa Romeo	Ferrari	C43	327.9 (203.7)
11	10	Pierre Gasly	Alpine	Renault	A523	327.3 (203.4)
12	44	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	Mercedes	W14	326.9 (203.1)
13	24	Zhou Guanyu	Alfa Romeo	Ferrari	C43	326.2 (202.7)
14	81	Oscar Piastri	McLaren	Mercedes	MCL60	326.1 (202.6)
15	63	George Russell	Mercedes	Mercedes	W14	325.0 (201.9)
16	3	Daniel Ricciardo	AlphaTauri	Honda RBPT	AT04	324.6 (201.7)
17	18	Lance Stroll	Aston Martin	Mercedes	AMR23	324.3 (201.5)
18	14	Fernando Alonso	Aston Martin	Mercedes	AMR23	323.7 (201.1)
19	22	Yuki Tsunoda	AlphaTauri	Honda RBPT	AT04	323.6 (201.1)
20	4	Lando Norris	McLaren	Mercedes	MCL60	323.1 (200.8)

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Over to you

Will Ferrari, Mercedes or McLaren take the fight to Verstappen – or is their focus elsewhere? Share your views on the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix in the comments.

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