In the round-up: Williams confirm Alexander Albon’s suspicions that a spike in his tyre temperatures contributed to his race-ending crash.
In brief
Turn five error led to Albon’s crash
Alexander Albon claimed his crash at turn six during yesterday’s race came about because his tyre temperatures rose when he ran wide at the previous corner.
“When I lost the car, I was going through slower than the previous lap,” he explained after the race. “I went wide on the corner before and spiked the tyre temperatures, losing grip and [went] into the next corner a bit hot, so I think that’s what happened but we need to look at it.”
The team’s head of vehicle performance Dave Robson affirmed Albon’s explanation. “Unfortunately, touching the kerb at high speed in turn five led to a small snap and a spike in tyre temperature, which led him to lose the car at the next corner,” he said.
Sainz’s penalty “too harsh” – Alonso
Fernando Alonso agreed with Carlos Sainz Jnr’s view that the stewards should not have penalised the Ferrari driver for the collision between the pair during the standing restart at the end of the race.“Probably the penalty is too harsh, I think, because on lap one, it is very difficult always to judge what the grip level,” he said. “I think we don’t go intentionally into another car, you know? Because we know that we risk also our car and our final position.
“Sometimes you ended up in places that you wish you were not there in that moment. And it’s just part of racing, but I didn’t see the replay properly, but for me, it feels too hard.”
Junior drivers penalised for restart crashes
Formula 2 and Formula 3 drivers were penalised for crashes around Safety Car periods in yesterday’s races.
Victor Martins locked up at the penultimate corner and rear-ended Dennis Hauger at turn 13 as the F2 race restarted with three laps to go. The pair, who were disputing third place at the time, finished out of the points. The Alpine junior was therefore given a 10-second time penalty which demoted him from 16th to 18th, and two penalty points were added to his licence.
In F3, Kaylen Frederick was accelerating and decelerating to maintain tyre temperatures during a Safety Car period, but misjudged his speed differential to Nikola Tsolov and hit the back of his ART team mate at turn three. Frederick, who retired from the race, has been given a 10-place grid penalty for the next race he competes in, while three points have been added to his licence.
The stewards deemed both competitors “wholly responsible” for their incidents. In Frederick’s case they added “drivers must exercise the needed diligence and caution during Safety Car periods, and must not make erratic manoeuvres that would danger themselves or others.”
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Links
Motor racing links of interest:
Gian Carlo Minardi: 'Every decision is justified under the word “safety” but today, with these decisions, the drivers were once again put in even more danger. They could have easily used the SC and the VSC as always, without making all these pantomimes.'
Jody Egginton: 'The pace of the car was not there on all compounds, and we struggled for straight-line speed, as such, we weren’t able to attack nor hold position in some phases of the race.'
Alessandro Alunni Bravi: 'We kept pushing, we executed the race well and we placed ourselves in the position to capitalise on the opportunities when they came our way: luck is only getting a chance, we had to seize it. We were actually quite unlucky with the timing of the first red flag: we had both cars on the right strategy to fight for the top ten, but the stoppage, and the free stop it gifted everyone else, effectively jeopardised our afternoon.'
Hill’s Schumacher revelation is absolutely tragic (News Australia)
'I wanted to show my support for them and for the family, for Corinna and the children. I know what it was like to have lost my dad when I was 15. It’s an awful thing. He’s still in care. It’s a tough thing to have to bear.'
F1 boss Domenicali heralds F1 Australian Grand Prix (Speedcafe)
'The growth of the sport is related to the fact that Andrew, under the supervision of Paul Little, did really well – the team did an incredible job. To have more than 450,000 people for the weekend is just massive, it’s just great.'
Correa reaping the rewards of ‘crazy’ feature race but qualifying holding him back (F2)
'So far, we haven’t started any races higher than P12, which makes it difficult. You’re in the middle of it, so that’s when incidents happen. We just have to get ourselves into the top 10 in Qualifying and we will be good.'
We always endeavour to credit original sources. If you have a tip for a link relating to single-seater motorsport to feature in the next RaceFans round-up please send it to us via the contact form.
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Social media
Notable posts from Twitter, Instagram and more:
Would love to know what this was in response to 😂 @LandoNorris #AusGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/KKn9RMMUvp
— Henry Leighton (@hen_da_man) April 2, 2023
If you were looking forward to a fight for victory between two multiple champions with plenty of history, you can thank the ludicrously over-powered DRS for ensuring we don't get it. #F1 #AustralianGP
— Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine) April 2, 2023
@jadeejenkinss No one was harmed in the making of this… From the insane third restart #f1 #ausgp
🏎️ Chaos on the #AUSGP #F1 track at turn 3 after the race.
Stewards and officials trying to get Kevin Magnussen and Charles LeClerc's cars onto tow trucks while crowds storm the track. pic.twitter.com/XBNnJ3DDL3
— 𝑫𝒂𝒎𝒊𝒆𝒏 𝑷𝒆𝒄𝒌 (@damopeck) April 2, 2023
Just watched the F1 race highlights.
Chaos. But in general I’m not aligned with the reset caused by a red flag after a start accident. Not fair by someone doing a good job avoiding crashes.
I have to think a bit but probably the most fair is to use the mini-loops to organize
— Lucas Di Grassi (@LucasdiGrassi) April 2, 2023
@fia you have embarrassed yourselves today with @F1 What an unnecessary mess.
Please remember everyone, this is a sport first and entertainment second, not the other way around.— Casey Stoner AM (@Official_CS27) April 2, 2023
OK stuff @F1 and all its amateur dramatics, that Texas @Indycar race was epic! And they happily ended the race under full course yellow after Grosjean, who had briefly led, hit the wall fighting for 4th.
They don't need to 'race to the finish' when the racing has been so intense!— Tiff Needell (@tiff_tv) April 2, 2023
Just got around to watching the Indycar race and they kicked ass today. Wish the oval racing was like that more often 👍🏼
— Sage Karam (@SageKaram) April 2, 2023
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- Find more official F1 accounts to follow in the F1 Twitter Directory
Comment of the day
The stewards’ decisions in yesterday’s race baffled many readers.
Baffled by how Sainz got a penalty when clearly trying to avoid Alonso when Sargeant does a Stroll and rams De Vries off into the gravel. The stewards seemed to be pretty random when it comes to handing out punishments on the one hand and calling things ‘first lap incidents’ without consequences on the other.
Really feels like they thought they had to act because of the consequence: Alonso getting knocked off of the podium and Sainz getting on it.
Steve (@Duuxdeluxe)
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday to Jt19, Shreyas Mohanty, William and William Olive!
On this day in motorsport
- 35 years ago today Alain Prost won the season-opening Brazilian Grand Prix while Ayrton Senna was disqualified on his McLaren debut
Sam (@crunch)
3rd April 2023, 0:39
Of course Alonso would stick up for his fellow compatriot when the results of the restart didn’t stick for him. Just so brutally unfair on Sainz and Alpine to succumb to the farcical circus. More drivers like Casey Stoner who are outside the F1 bubble need to voice their opinion.
Sensord4notbeingafanboi (@peartree)
3rd April 2023, 1:38
Casey was a rider. Today topped the charts, the most farcical race since Charlie Whiting passed away just before the Aus GP. Fia has had plenty of time to restructure.
MichaelN
3rd April 2023, 10:38
Alonso is just trying to prevent getting a penalty himself should he find himself in this position again.
Not that he has to worry. Apparently Ferrari is the only team to get penalties.
Nick T.
3rd April 2023, 14:57
Brutally unfair? Why cause Sainz was driving like a dunce along with Gasly, both of whom braked comically late and neither of whom had a prayer of making that corner. And you’re blaming Alonso for simply being there. Your levels of bias are comical.
OOliver
3rd April 2023, 3:42
“When I lost the car, I was going through slower than the previous lap,” he explained after the race. “I went wide on the corner before and spiked the tyre temperatures, losing grip and [went] into the next corner a bit hot, so I think that’s what happened but we need to look at it.”
That says it all.
Boomerang
3rd April 2023, 7:13
I reckon Magnussen had the same issue.
I have an opinion
3rd April 2023, 11:14
The Williams was set up with low downforce and drag. Albon was wringing it on the limit everywhere — shame he couldn’t hang onto it for the entire race.
pastaman
3rd April 2023, 13:33
“When I lost the car, I was going through slower than the previous lap”
I think when he says he went in hot, he was talking about the tire temps
Jere (@jerejj)
3rd April 2023, 6:50
I also wondered about the possible impact the previous corner exit could’ve had on him suddenly losing the rear.
Perhaps too harsh, but ultimately he messed up & on a related note to COTD, I don’t mind that Sargeant didn’t get penalized.
Everything was a mess anyway, thanks to Wittich.
Giancarlo Minardi, Casey Stoner, & Tiff Needell couldn’t be more spot-on.
FIA race control seriously needs to stop with all these ridiculous & unjustified attempts towards artificially-created randomness for good, not only for sporting fairness’s sake but also before someone possibly gets hurt.
Damien Peck’s tweet shows that AGPC also managed to cause a mess by seemingly never utilizing preventive measures.
Perhaps the reinstated activation zone will return to its 2022 length for next season & preferably also a separate (& already-existing) detection for the zone after.
The other two consecutive zones should also have separate detections, & Montreal’s back-S/F straights, Mexico’s S/F-T3/4 straights, etc. Interlagos, YMC, Sakhir, etc., have separate detections for consecutive zones with only 1-3 corners between, so FIA has zero excuses for not having separate ones on all tracks with similarly-successive zones.
However, the reinstated activation zone wasn’t the reason for not getting a victory battle, as Max, with his car advantage, would’ve passed him for the lead anyway.
Proesterchen (@proesterchen)
3rd April 2023, 8:37
I seem to remember that the first two DRS zones are intentionally linked because the start-finish-straight isn’t long enough to provide much of an overtaking opportunity, and they are set up to allow for overtaking at T3.
Phil Norman (@phil-f1-21)
3rd April 2023, 11:04
“Giancarlo Minardi, Casey Stoner, & Tiff Needell couldn’t be more spot-on.
FIA race control seriously needs to stop with all these ridiculous & unjustified attempts towards artificially-created randomness for good, not only for sporting fairness’s sake but also before someone possibly gets hurt.”
I could not agree more.
S
3rd April 2023, 11:53
If anyone gets hurt, it’s not the FIA’s fault.
Drivers driving erratically and/or in an unsafe manner are the sole cause.
Nobody else is turning the steering wheels or pushing the pedals, are they.
Simon
3rd April 2023, 16:48
@jerejj
6 hours, 49 minutes
Jere (@jerejj)
3rd April 2023, 17:18
@Simon I don’t get your reference.
Proesterchen (@proesterchen)
3rd April 2023, 8:34
That’s a terrible take from @keithcollantine on Twitter.
If you felt denied a more prolonged fight, please direct your ire at the team with the significantly slower car. (that also blew up in 50% of cases) It is them that failed you.
David (@nvherman)
3rd April 2023, 9:49
@proesterchen I totally agree. It’s not the fault of the DRS that Verstappen could just pull the gap he did so easily, after all, once he was more than 1 second in front, there was no DRS involved anyway. Adrian Newey has designed yet another rocketship, and for once, Mercedes don’t have enough engine to overcome this. Also, Verstappen is a driver at the peak of his career, where with the best will in the world, Hamilton is not any more. Maybe two years ago, but not now. Although even at his current level, he would still beat most others in the same machinery. I believe that Verstappen, Hamilton, Alonso, Russell and Norris are the current best drivers in the field. I used to believe Leclerc was, but he seems to have lost something currently. Although maybe that’s frustration and disillusionment with Ferrari.
Also, look at Perez’s overtakes: even though he had DRS for many of them, so did the driver he was overtaking, so the effect would be cancelled out
bosyber (@bosyber)
3rd April 2023, 12:42
The bit about Hamilton is irrelevant with the gap in straight-line speed, but I do agree that while the DRS was super for Verstappen who had been able to set up that overtake for a few laps @nvherman and @proesterchen, the driver/car combo was also just a lot faster which was why he was going to get past anyway; he used DRS there as it was the simplest way for him to get past, not the only way. In previous seasons we had situations like that too though with different cars. I do think the DRS there was maybe a bit too long much on that straight, but looking at the whole race, it wasn’t clearly way too much.
we could see that Perez had to do his overtakes at the end of the straight, sitting in a DRS train for much of it (though w/o that train, maybe it might have been more effective for him too, or not needing it altogether) and then having to work his way up in the race so he had few parts with clean air to set up his overtakes like that Verstapen one (who himself also had a lot more trouble when behind HAM who had Russell’s DRS). And Norris & Piastri only managed to overtake due to that DRS keeping them hanging on through the fast bits, while they were clearly faster in the slower bits when in clean air, ie. what DRS is designed for.
Must be pretty hard for the race organisers to properly tune it when cars have such differing amounts of drag.
One could argue that the issue of DRS trains shows DRS isn’t the ultimate solution, as it is effectively much like a ‘Trulli-train’ a slower car being able to hold up faster cars due to the 1st, though even there, once a fast car behind forced an error, the in-fighting often created a three or more car shuffle that ended up with it either dissolving, for good attacks, or reshuffling when the 1st was defending well. It’s a bit artificial I guess, but it still showed good race craft.
PeterG
3rd April 2023, 14:42
@nvherman But it was the fault of DRS that what could have been a fun fight for the lead was made far too easy due to DRS giving Max a 19kph speed boost.
Without DRS the speed difference between the 2 cars would have been less & Lewis likely would have been able to defend which would have give us a longer fight for the lead, Like we used to have in the Pre-Gimmick days of real racing!
DRS just helps make passing far too easy & robs fans of seeing longer fights. I want to see more of those fights & less of the boringly easy DRS push of a button highway passing! I want to see real racing, Hard fought racing & not this silly boring quantity over quality gimmick button passes.
Grapmg
3rd April 2023, 10:03
I always loved the fights between a slower car defending against a faster car behind. DRS has killed that excitement. I fully agree with Keith.
Proesterchen (@proesterchen)
3rd April 2023, 11:00
DRS doesn’t do that. It just moves the window of delta-t where that is a viable strategy.
And clearly, the surviving Mercedes was not able to lap the circuit quick enough to hit that window.
Grapmg
3rd April 2023, 12:54
Maybe true but we will never know thanks to DRS.
Proesterchen (@proesterchen)
3rd April 2023, 14:05
We know because said Mercedes was overtaken.
F1 frog (@f1frog)
3rd April 2023, 10:06
If there had been no DRS, it would technically have been possible for Lewis Hamilton to win the Australian Grand Prix today. If he had really decided that he would give absolutely everything to keep Verstappen behind, he could have defended his line into every corner, and could have negated Verstappen’s extra straightline speed by getting good exits. So if he had driven practically perfectly all race, he would have won anyway despite the inferior car, just as Gilles Villeneuve did in Jarama 1981. And if Verstappen had wanted to get past he would have had to pull off a truly outstanding overtake somewhere. I suspect at some point he would have managed it. But that is what is meant by a fight for victory and, as usual, DRS ruined it.
MichaelN
3rd April 2023, 10:35
But who wants a battle when you can have OvErTaKiNg!1!
DRS is a joke, and will always be no matter how cute they make the TV graphics.
Keith is spot on. Verstappen vs. Hamilton is a ticket selling prospect, and thanks to DRS it was so dull that nobody will remember it.
Phil Norman (@phil-f1-21)
3rd April 2023, 10:59
+ 1
Nick T.
3rd April 2023, 15:02
Careful guys. Max will threaten to quit if they get rid of DRS or make any other changes he doesn’t like as if the sport’s survival depends on him.
Grapmg
3rd April 2023, 16:02
Nothing to do with Max. We have seen so many of these DRS moves from mercedes the last decade. So nothing new here. Just hoped DRS would be banned with the new cars but that proofed idle hope.
Proesterchen (@proesterchen)
3rd April 2023, 11:03
You seem to argue from a previously conceived conclusion.
DRS didn’t ruin it, Mercedes brought a car to this race (and many in the past year+) that didn’t allow their drivers to defend against the quicker Red Bull.
PeterG
3rd April 2023, 14:38
@proesterchen Without DRS been so overpowered the straght line speed advantage Max had wouldn’t have been 19kph & Lewis may have been able to hold on for longer because defending would have been significantly more possible.
With DRS giving such an absurd speed advantage defending is essentially impossible. Lewis moved to the inside to try and defend but that 19kph speed gain from DRS allowed Max to just push of a button highway pass himself past with ease well before they got anywhere near the corner.
That is purely down to DRS as was pointed out by all the Ex-F1 drivers that were part of the F1TV broadcast this weekend.
Jere (@jerejj)
3rd April 2023, 16:59
@PeterG Max would’ve eventually passed him anyway, even without the reinstated activation zone.
Proesterchen (@proesterchen)
3rd April 2023, 17:00
It is not, provided a team and driver are competent enough to bring competitive equipment to the races.
The problem here is that Mercedes didn’t, which is why their remaining car was easily overtaken by the Red Bull.
Grapmg
3rd April 2023, 11:59
I bet Max didn’t defend hard against MBs at the start because he knew he would fly by the moment DRS was enabled. I’m a Max fan but I would have loved to see Lewis hold back Max for the whole race just to see them battle for it.
SteveP
3rd April 2023, 17:53
Me too, and I think you probably have support from LH on that too, not because it would have been a win (which he would like) but more because it involved actual competitive racing.
Of course the reason MB were close to RBR directly from the start might be because of a small tweak by RBR to avoid close scrutiny and nobbling by the FIA.
Yes MB were faster than Ferarri, but that’s merely MB stepping over a bar of reducing height. Sadly the main enemy Ferrari face is themselves.
Nick T.
4th April 2023, 0:22
He stated this himself.
Phil Norman (@phil-f1-21)
3rd April 2023, 11:01
Mr Minardi sums this up precisely. These decisions are ruining the sport probably more so than of the other myriad of poor decisions affecting F1. I hope the drivers and the teams really pursue this point at their meeting with the FIA.
Phil Norman (@phil-f1-21)
3rd April 2023, 11:02
‘any of the other’.
Nick T.
3rd April 2023, 14:59
If the tires are this sensitive. They need changing.