Hamilton charges through to 2nd after a mistake as Verstappen takes facile win

By Malhaar Khaladkar

Max Verstappen took an excellent victory in a drama filled Emilia Romagna Grand Prix held at the iconic Imola circuit as Lewis Hamilton recovered to P2 after making a mistake and Lando Norris’s superb drive earned him 3^rd position.

London, 19 April 2021: Max Verstappen took his 11^th career victory as Lewis Hamilton charged through the field and recovered to P2 and got the fastest lap of the race with Lando Norris completing the podium at Imola. Home favorites Ferrari finished in P4 and P5, Charles Leclerc finishing ahead of Carlos Sainz. McLaren’s new recruit Daniel Ricciardo finished in P6, who admitted he could not match the pace of his younger teammate Norris. Alpha Tauri’s Pierre Gasly finished P7, ahead of Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll as he received a 5-second post-race penalty for overtaking Gasly illegally. Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso completed the top 10, earning Alpine their first points of the season.

Red Bull’s other driver Sergio Perez had a dismal race as he finished P11, ahead of Japanese rookie Yuki Tsunoda. Kimi Raikkonen received a 30-second post-race penalty for start infringement which demoted him to P13, ahead of Alfa Romeo teammate Antonio Giovinazzi. Sebastian Vettel was classified in P15 but retired two laps from the end due to gearbox issue. Haas duo of Mick Schumacher and Nikita Mazepin finished in P16 and P17 respectively. Valtteri Bottas and George Russell were involved in big crash as they DNF’d, as did Nicholas Latifi on lap 1.

The heavens opened up 30 min before the race start as it poured down on the track. This meant it would be a wet start. 16 of the 20 drivers chose to start on intermediate tyres whereas, the Haas drivers, Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly chose full wet tyres. Verstappen got an excellent start in 2^nd gear and jumped Hamilton, who started from pole. Hamilton and Verstappen made slight contact and the Mercedes driver went over high kerbs in turn 2 damaging his front wing endplate. Behind Perez lost P3 to Leclerc as well. On lap 2 the safety car was called out as Latifi and Mazepin came together, taking Latifi out of the race.

At the race restart, Hamilton tried to pull a move around Verstappen but to no avail had to back out and settle in P2. Meanwhile Perez was handed a 10-second time penalty for overtaking under the safety car. Gasly being on the wet tyres was much slower and therefore held up a train of cars. Eventually Norris, Ricciardo, Sainz, Stroll and Bottas made their way through. Gasly got rid of the wet tyres for intermediates on lap 14, emerging 17^th in the race.

Team orders were at play at McLaren as Norris was allowed to pass Ricciardo due to the Britain having much stronger pace.Sainz caught up to the struggling McLaren of Ricciardo after making multiple mistakes and going off track.

The track had started to dry up with Vettel being the first one to pit for dry tyres on lap 20. At the front, Red Bull called in Verstappen for dry tyres on lap 27, meanwhile, Hamilton stayed out hoping to overcut the leader. Hamilton had a fast in lap, but due to a slower pitstop than usual he emerged 5-seconds behind the leader. As he tried hunting down Verstappen, in getting past a lapped car, he went onto a wet part at turn 7, slid off track and into the barrier thus, damaging his front wing. He slowly reversed and recovered his car onto the track.

Behind a huge crash happened as Russell in an attempt to overtake Bottas went onto the wet grass and lost control of the car. He collected Bottas and both went into the barrier taking them out of the race. The race was red flagged. This was a blessing for Hamilton as he had pitted and emerged a lap down, with red flag he would be on the lead lap again, in P9.

The race resumed in the form of rolling start, as Verstappen half spun but maintained the lead before green flag was waived. Both Norris and Ricciardo had changed to soft tyres in a bid to overtake the Ferrari’s early on. That is exactly what happened as Norris got past Leclerc in P2. Meanwhile, Verstappen had started to check out in the lead. Behind, a fast-charging Hamilton was making up positions. By lap 43 he overtook Ricciardo for P5, by lap 50 he was past Sainz for P4, lap 55 he overtook Leclerc for P3 and on lap 60 Hamilton was able to get past Norris for P2, in the process setting the fastest lap of the race and recovering to where he was before his off-track mistake.

Verstappen finished 22 seconds in the lead as he had a near perfect race. It means he is now just one point behind championship leader Hamilton. This was another close race with the honours going to Red Bull this time.

Red Bull did not have the dominant pace like they showed in Bahrain as Mercedes were much closer. But a near perfect execution of the race enabled them to take victory. Perez had a disappointing race as he spun and dropped out of the points. Red Bull will be hoping to have the support of the second car next time around. Mercedes showed improvement compared to Bahrain with drivers having much more confidence in the W12. It is evident from Hamilton’s pole position on Saturday. Mercedes has also worked on the drivability of the engine which has helped in better torque distribution and a more stable rear end.

McLaren had the pace to challenge Mercedes and Red Bull in one lap pace as evident from Norris’s lap in Q3 (which was deleted due to track limits violation). Race pace wise they are still behind the top 2 but look like the class of the midfield, ahead of rivals Ferrari. Ferrari has considerably improved compared to 2020 with Leclerc qualifying and fighting for podium on merit rather than being a one-off chance. AlphaTauri again impressed in qualifying but failed to capitalise in the race due to wrong strategy. They have showed good pace but remains to be seen if they can consistently challenge McLaren and Ferrari over the whole season.

Aston Martin have struggled to adapt to the new regulations as they argue that the low rake cars were hit harder than the high rake cars. They have taken the subject matter over to the FIA. On pace terms they seem slower than AlphaTauri or Ferrari but have managed points through Stroll in both the races. Alpine too, seem to be struggling as they were on the fringes of points. Their car has been unable to challenge the upper midfield teams so far even though they introduced an extensive aerodynamic package at Imola. It remains to be seen if produces the expected performance.

Both Alfa Romeo and Williams had positive race weekend as they had pace to run in the top 10. Raikkonen finished in the points but the post-race time penalty meant he scored nil. For Williams it was a positive weekend in that both cars had the pace to finish in the points. The negative was that either of them failed to finish the race. Haas had another dismal weekend, but it is to be expected a both the rookie drivers are getting up to speed and their car is underdeveloped compared to the rest of the field.

Saturday Qualifying results were:

Note – Tsunoda failed to set a qualifying time within the Q1 107% requirement, so races at stewards’ discretion. Penalised five places for an unscheduled gearbox change and required to start from the back of the grid for use of additional power unit elements.