Sao Paulo Grand Prix

Lewis Hamilton scripted an epic win after a no-holds barred duel with Max Verstappen at the São Paulo Grand Prix in Brazil. Valtteri Bottas joined his team-mate on the podium. This was a must win race for the reigning world champion at the nineteenth race of the 2021 FIA Formula 1 World Championship. With three races to go, Hamilton could not let Verstappen extend his lead in the drivers’ championship to more than a race win. The Brazilian weekend has been an uphill battle after Hamilton won qualification and was disqualified for a DRS technical infringement. Hamilton started last in the sprint qualification race and fought back to fifth position. The Briton started tenth in the race after a five-place grid penalty was applied for a new power unit component. Hamilton from tenth place on the grid fought hard to take his sixth win of the season and cut the gap to Verstappen in the drivers’ championship to fourteen points. The race at the Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace circuit in São Paulo took place under hot conditions with air temperatures at 23 degree C and track temperatures at 55 degree C. Kimi Räikkönen made a pit lane start after his rear-wing was changed. Verstappen had a good start from second position and led pole-sitter Bottas into Turn 1. Bottas for good measure went off the track at Turn 4 and Sergio Pérez was in second position. It was a Red Bull Racing 1-2 by end of lap 1. Hamilton had gained three places and slotted into seventh position. Lando Norris had suffered a puncture as he tried to get past the Ferrari of Carlos Sainz into Turn 1 and pitted and rejoined in last position. By the end of lap 4, Hamilton was let past by Bottas and was in third position. Yuki Tsunoda and Lance Stroll came together withTsunoda suffering extensive damage. The Safety Car was deployed as debris had to be removed from the track. On the restart, both the Red Bull Racing drivers made a good getaway from Hamilton. Hamilton had a hard battle with Pérez and finally overtook the Mexican on lap 19. Hamilton was now 3.6 seconds behind Verstappen and it was going to be a straight fight for the win between the championship rivals. On lap 23, Stroll was the first driver to pit for the hard compound tyres and rejoined in nineteenth position. On lap 27, Hamilton pitted for the hard compound tyres and rejoined in sixth position behind Daniel Ricciardo and ahead of Sebastian Vettel. The undercut is powerful at this track and Verstappen pitted on the next lap but his gap to Hamilton was cut to 1.5 seconds. On the next lap, Pérez pitted and rejoined in fifth position. The Virtual Safety Car (VSC) was deployed due to debris on the track from Stroll’s car. This handed Bottas an advantage as he pitted under the VSC and rejoined in front of Pérez in third position. Behind them the two Scuderia Ferrari drivers, Pierre Gasly and the Alpine F1 team drivers were battling for position. Norris had progressed through the field to get himself into the points. On lap 41, Verstappen pitted for another set of hard compound tyres and rejoined in fifth position behind Leclerc. Bottas and Pérez pitted in quick succession in the next laps. Hamilton stayed out for another three laps in the lead of the race before he pitted and rejoined behind Verstappen. The gap between the two drivers was 2.6 seconds. Hamilton got himself within DRS-range and on lap 47 made an overtake move which Verstappen thwarted aggressively. The stewards noted the incident before deciding no action was necessary. On lap 59, Hamilton finally battled past Verstappen and cruised to a win. With all the setbacks Hamilton suffered this weekend, it was an epic win. Verstappen finished in second position and still leads the championship by 14 points. Bottas finished in third position and helped Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team extend the lead in the constructors’ championship to 11 points. Pérez finished in fourth position as he pitted in the final laps for the soft compound tyres to take the point for fastest lap from Hamilton. Leclerc finished ahead of Sainz as Ferrari had a good haul of points to increase their lead to the McLaren F1 team for third position in the constructor’s championship. Gasly battled his way to seventh position ahead of the Alpine F1 drivers, Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso. Norris took the final solitary point after he battled his way from last position after the first lap incident. The epic duel between Verstappen and Hamilton will resume in Qatar next weekend (Nov 19-21 2021). The track at this new race on the Formula 1 calendar is an unknown quantity and adds more variables to this intense battle for the championships. 2021 F1 SAO PAULO GRAND PRIX – RESULTS POS DRIVER NAT. TEAM TIME 1 Lewis Hamilton GBR Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team 71 Laps 2 Max Verstappen NED Red Bull Racing + 10.496s 3 Valtteri Bottas FIN Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team + 13.576s 4 Sergio Perez MEX Red Bull Racing + 39.940s 5 Charles Leclerc MON Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow + 49.517s 6 Carlos Sainz ESP Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow + 51.820s 7 Pierre Gasly FRA Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda + 1 Lap 8 Esteban Ocon FRA Alpine F1 Team + 1 Lap 9 Fernando Alonso ESP Alpine F1 Team + 1 Lap 10 Lando Norris GBR McLaren F1 Team + 1 Lap 11 Sebastian Vettel GER Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team + 1 Lap 12 Kimi Raikkonen FIN Alfa Romeo Racing Orlen + 1 Lap 13 George Russell GBR Williams Racing + 1 Lap 14 Antonio Giovinazzi ITA Alfa Romeo Racing Orlen + 1 Lap 15 Yuki Tsunoda JPN Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda + 1 Lap 16 Nicholas Latifi CAN Williams Racing + 1 Lap 17 Nikita Mazepin RUS Uralkali Haas F1 Team + 2 Laps 18 Mick Schumacher…

Championship leader Max Verstappen has been fined for touching Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes W12 in perf ferme conditions yesterday following the qualifying session for the Sao Paulo Grand Prix. The talk of the paddock on Saturday morning was the on-going investigation of Hamilton’s DRS overtaking aid and Verstappen’s summons to the stewards for an alleged breach of the International Sporting Code. “The stewards also examined a fan video taken from across the track, CCTV video footage taken from pit lane and in car footage from car 14, car 33, car 44 and car 77. “In all, these videos gave a clear picture of what occurred in parc fermé following the qualifying session. Verstappen exits the car, then moves to the rear of his car. He then takes his gloves off and puts his right hand at the slot-gap of the rear wing of his car. He then moves to car 44 and repeats the exercise, touching the rear wing in two places, once on either side of the DRS actuation device, but on the bottom rear side of the wing, in the area of the slot gap and never near the actuator or the end fixation points.” “Clear, high definition video from the rear facing roll-hoop camera on car 44 shows that there is absolutely no movement of any of the wing elements on car 44 when Verstappen touches the back of the wing and the Stewards are satisfied, from watching all the videos, his body position and the video of the wing, that there was insignificant force when Verstappen touched the wing.” “It is clear to the Stewards that it has become a habit of the drivers to touch cars after qualifying and the races. This was also the explanation of Verstappen, that it was simply habit to touch this area of the car which has been a point of speculation in recent races between both teams. This general tendency has been seen as mostly harmless and so has not been uniformly policed. Nevertheless, it is a breach of the parc fermé regulation and has significant potential to cause harm,” read the FIA statement. “Considering the fact that no direct harm was caused in this case, in the opinion of the stewards, and that no earlier precedent of penalties for this exists – on the one hand; but that it is a breach of the regulation and has potential for serious consequences on the other, the stewards determine to take action in this case and order a fine of €50,000. The stewards further note that it is intended that all teams and drivers take notice that future breaches may incur different penalties from the stewards of those events.”

Lewis Hamilton was quickest in the first and only practice ahead of Sao Paulo Grand Prix qualifying – but Mercedes and Red Bull had different approaches to the session. Hamilton, who has a five-place engine penalty to overcome on Sunday after a new ICE was fitted to his W12 car, was three tenths quicker than rival Max Verstappen. However, Red Bull seemed more focused on race pace compared to Mercedes, where one-lap pace was of more importance. The data collected from AWS suggested the gap between Hamilton and Verstappen was much closer, just o.50s heading into qualifying. Sergio Perez completed the top three with Valtteri Bottas behind in P4. Pierre Gasly, Carlos Sainz, Charles Leclerc, Esteban Ocon, Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll completed the top 10. There was an even greater importance placed on a cool, overcast FP1 session, with drivers and teams restricted to just one hour of practice before being thrown straight into qualifying later on Friday afternoon – Formula 1 completing its third and final sprint weekend of the 2021 season. As the cars hit the track for the first time, confirmation came from the FIA of a fifth ICE element being fitted to Lewis Hamilton’s W12, which will result in a five-place grid drop for the seven-time World Champion for Sunday’s race. But it wasn’t the new engine causing Hamilton problems in the early stages of FP1, it was the front suspension instead. In the opening runs, Hamilton asked via team radio for a “solution to be found” as he bobbled and bounced around the Interlagos circuit. He found himself eight tenths down on title rival Verstappen, who set the opening benchmark at 1:10.189, a slender 0.020s ahead of Red Bull team-mate Perez. As we approached the halfway stage of the session, Lance Stroll reported spots of rain dropping on the circuit, keeping the paddock on their toes ahead of qualifying. Even though the clouds looked particularly dark and brooding, it was still dry enough for drivers to continue with their dry tyre running for the rest of the session. Verstappen re-emerged on the soft tyre compound for a qualifying sim run and promptly ate five tenths out of his previous best time by the time he had completed the second sector. He crossed the line with a 1:09.417 to his name, Perez still falling just short of the target by being 0.075s behind. In the other Mercedes, meanwhile, Bottas was struggling to make an impression on Verstappen’s leading time. He had to abort his first attempt at a hot lap and, on his second, already found himself two tenths down in the first sector. Traffic in the middle sector did nothing to help his cause and he could only manage a 1:09.857 to sit nearly five tenths off the pace. With 16 minutes of the session remaining, Hamilton, complete with front suspension tweak, put pedal to the metal for his qualifying sim attempt. He all-but matched Verstappen through the first sector, but the gap would slowly increase to three tenths by the time he crossed the finish line. It provided further evidence that Red Bull were the ones to beat heading into Friday afternoon qualifying. Bottas would try to discredit it as he surprisingly went fastest in the first sector on his latest effort and, while still unable to topple Verstappen, he did move above his team-mate and to within a tenth off the pace. 2021 F1 SAO PAULO GRAND PRIX – FREE PRACTICE RESULTS (1) POS DRIVER NAT. TEAM TIME 1 Lewis Hamilton GBR Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team 1m09.050s 2 Max Verstappen NED Red Bull Racing 1m09.417s 3 Sergio Perez MEX Red Bull Racing 1m09.492s 4 Valtteri Bottas FIN Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team 1m09.567s 5 Pierre Gasly FRA Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda 1m09.880s 6 Carlos Sainz ESP Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow 1m10.124s 7 Charles Leclerc MON Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow 1m10.142s 8 Esteban Ocon FRA Alpine F1 Team 1m10.145s 9 Fernando Alonso CHI Alpine F1 Team 1m10.201s 10 Lance Stroll CAN Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team 1m10.352s 11 Yuki Tsunoda JPN Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda 1m10.374s 12 Sebastian Vettel GER Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team 1m10.413s 13 Kimi Raikkonen FIN Alfa Romeo Racing Orlen 1m10.443s 14 Antonio Giovinazzi GBR Alfa Romeo Racing Orlen 1m10.587s 15 Lando Norris GBR McLaren F1 Team 1m10.610s 16 Mick Schumacher GER Uralkali Haas F1 Team 1m10.885s 17 Nicholas Latifi CAN Williams Racing 1m10.902s 18 George Russell ISR Williams Racing 1m10.938s 19 Daniel Ricciardo AUS McLaren F1 Team 1m10.990s 20 Nikita Mazepin RUS Uralkali Haas F1 Team 1m11.342s