3 minute read
The 2021 French Grand Prix gave fans both an exciting race, and an insight into what the rest of the season might hold.
Max Verstappen made his eventual win harder than it had to be after he went a little too hard into Turn 1 right after lights out, running wide and giving Lewis Hamilton the front seat, while Verstappen retained second place. Early in the race, severe tyre degradation became apparent with the preferred medium tyres (C3) being abused on the abrasive curbs. Hamilton radioed to his team that the mediums “Won’t be able to go as long as we thought”. Fernando Alonso and Carlos Sainz also noted that all racers were struggling. This tyre surprise which seemed to catch most teams off guard could be attributed to rainfall that had occurred a few hours prior to the start of the race, stripping the track of the accumulated rubber from the Practice sessions and Qualifying.
With teams knowing their tyre life predictions would all fall short, the question quickly arose of whether a two-stop strategy would come out on top of the traditional one stopper in France. An early pit from Daniel Ricciardo proved useful with fresh hard tyres (C3), showing a far superior race pace over the 16 lap old mediums of the rest of the field. Valtteri Botas was the first of the front runners to come in, with Mercedes seemingly confused as to which strategy to commit to. Redbull did not have such confusion and brought in Verstappen the following lap (17), attempting to undercut the Mercedes of Hamilton. Hamilton was brought in on lap 18, countering Verstappen’s undercut, however it was useless as Verstappen on his out lap had managed to make up a remarkable three second gap ahead of Hamilton, much to the surprise of viewers, fans and probably Christian Horner himself. The ball had fallen at the feet of Redbull, but the race was far from over.
Sergio Perez was the last of the front runners to pit after reporting minimal tyre wear problems. Once Perez had pitted (lap 23) he resumed his position of 4th, behind Bottas. Verstappen surprised everyone again by pitting on lap 31 and emerging with a fresh set of medium tyres. It was a truly shocking move since Verstappen held a strong lead and his tyres were only 1 lap older than Hamilton’s. Mercedes had their first 1-2 of the race however the hungry Verstappen was closing the gap at a rate of nearly two seconds a lap. Verstappen easily claimed second place from Bottas in the 43rd lap, and then eventually gained 1st place from Hamilton on the second last lap in a grandstand finish, which Max called an “easy pass”.
In the midfield battle both Maclaren drivers had something to prove. Lando Norris had some early errors, however he and Ricciardo were able to put their rivalry aside and focus on the team which ended in both drivers finishing in the top 6. Ferrari, reflective of their past 24 months, struggled. Both drivers tussled greatly with their tyres since the SF21 has tyre wear issues on good surfaces, let alone the French sandpaper. Leclerc mirrored Verstappen’s two-stop but instead of getting on the top step, he claimed a miserable 16th. Aston Martin ran another impressive race, utilising a similar strategy they had used in Baku. Otmar Szafnauer held his racers out far past the recommended pit window gifting them great track position, with Vettel running all the way up to 5th before pitting, and subsequently remained in the points, finishing 9th. Pierre Gasly at Alpha Tauri produced another stellar race and again proved he is amongst the best drivers on the grid.
Race Analysis
After missing out on their 2020 race, the return to France in 2021 did not disappoint. Max Verstappen’s hard earned win over Lewis Hamilton might just be a little taste of what’s to come for the rest of the 2021 season.
Verstappen coming in for his second pit shows the massive amount of confidence the Redbull crew have in the Dutchman. Not only did he need to make up the 30 seconds lost from the pit, but also had to overtake the seven-time world champion on the second last lap. Yet, the Redbull crew, or even Verstappen himself were not surprised when it happened on the 52nd lap. This level of confidence in both the RB16B and the 23-year-old himself proves these are not consolation victories any more, this is a genuine effort at grabbing both the driver and constructor championships. France 2021 proves Redbull are certainly in the running, and debatably the favourite to win this year by beating Mercedes on a new track. Whilst Redbull took victories in both Monaco and Baku, those GP’s benefited the RB16B and both races involved errors from the Mercedes team. Redbull’s calm reaction to Verstappen’s win indicates this was not luck at all, but in fact the start of something new.
Mercedes has a lot to think about after this race, namely their strategy and team dynamic. The Silver Arrows being caught off guard by the two-stop is ironic since it is the very strategy they pulled on Redbull back in Spain and also in Hungary during the 2020 season. Mercedes is known for their flawless strategy and to be caught out like this is highly uncharacteristic. Not only did they fail to compete with the two-stop, they failed to react to Redbull. Bottas and Hamilton only had a two lap age difference on their tyres, putting them on identical strategies. With Verstappen’s pace so high, it was inevitable he would catch the Mercedes’ and eventually overtake them. Toto Wolff and the Mercedes team should have acted with one of their drivers. Having both of them on an identical strategy effectively condemned them to the exact same fate. Redbull on the other hand had their drivers split. Verstappen with the 2 stop, but then Sergio Perez left out on the 1 stop. This greatly benefitted the Bulls with the race ending in a double podium. These close races often come down to strategical choices and having two drivers on the podium might give Redbull an edge in what could be a nail biting end to the season.
Another error of Mercedes is their team dynamic. Valtteri Bottas has always been driving in the shadow of the seven time world champion Lewis Hamilton. It must be extremely hard sharing a pit with one of the greatest drivers of all time, but does Valtteri just get pushed aside? In the French Grand Prix we can see evidence of Mercedes failing to treat Bottas as a viable option. Early in the race, after teams started seeing the severe degradation of the tyres, the idea of a two-stop was getting thrown around. A major problem with this is that all big teams were on mediums. Therefore, they didn’t have any clear data on the integrity of the hard tyre on the coarse, rain-washed circuit. Mercedes brought Valtteri in early and put him on hard tyres. It is likely this was to get some data on the life of the hard tyres, in a bid to give Lewis Hamilton a better chance of winning. This plan was thwarted when Verstappen came in a lap later, forcing Hamilton to act. Even so, Valtteri is thrown in the deep, only to increase Hamilton’s chance of winning. Valtteri was also overlooked when it came to his opinion of the strategy. In the latter stages of the race, with the impending Verstappen overtake, Valtteri explains over the radio to his team he ‘told them to do a 2 stop’. Valtteri’s actual communication involved more profanity. At some point in the race Bottas had the conversation with the team about strategy and they went against his ideas. Strangely enough, when Hamilton wants a say in the strategy, the team is nearly always in agreement with him. At the end of the day, he is a 7 time world champion and possesses a refined input for strategy, thus is a voice worth listening to. Valtteri does not have such a voice. Even so, it is clear the Mercedes drivers are unbalanced and this may have cost them another place on the podium.
During 2019 and even 2020, having Hamilton as lead driver over Bottas worked as the Mercedes cars dominated most circuits. Whether it was Hamilton-Bottas or Bottas-Hamilton, Mercedes consistently won. Redbull are now challenging Mercedes’ dominance and their driver structure may need to change to keep up. 2021 seems to be the start of something great for F1 and next week Mercedes will go into the belly of the beast; Austria - the Redbull Ring.
