F1. Emilia-Romagna 2024 Review

By Chelsea, Aiden and Gavin  (you know them by now)

Driver of the day

Chelsea – Lando Norris again made it look easy, driving a belter and finishing just seven tenths behind Verstappen.”Two more laps and I would have had him!” he cried, but I’m not as optimistic. Maybe twenty? Still, what a marvellous sight to see him gaining on Verstappen in the final stages, and Red Bull won’t be upset to see their livery getting a bit more camera time either.

Aiden – An uninspiring race sees an uninspiring choice for driver of the day…Max Verstappen’s fifth win in seven races this season came just hours after he won iRacing Nurburgring 24 hours virtual race with his Team Redline sim team. Yes, that’s right – the iRacing Nurburgring 24 hours virtual race. Some race he did from his hotel room…or something. I don’t know really, but he reckons he still got seven hours sleep after that which was enough to help extend his lead at the top of the championship once more. An honourable mention for Lando Norris who drove out of his orange overalls again to finish just 0.725 seconds behind the Dutchman in second place.

Gavin – Lando Norris edges it from Yuki Tsunoda for me. The McLaren driver is on a high after his first career win last time out in Miami and is justifying his long term commitment to the team with some great racing. Whatever they are doing at McLaren is clearly working, for both their drivers – Oscar Piastri qualified on the front row behind the Red Bull of Max Verstappen only to be penalised three places thereby promoting Lando to second. There is a feel good factor in that team and you can see the results now.

On any other weekend I would have opted for Yuki in the RB as he was on form in practice, qualifying, and the race and is still out-performing RB golden boy Daniel Ricciardo. His overtake itself, see below, is worthy of giving him the vote… So close.

 

Moment of the weekend

Chelsea – he Sainz/Piastri battle in the early stages. Piastri dropped from the front row to starting in 5th after being penalised in qualifying, leaving him fighting Carlos Sainz for the first 20 laps of the race. Eventually Sainz was bested, finishing eight seconds behind Piastri, but there was some enjoyable nudging on the way.

Aiden – Moment may be a stretch, but hey….I’m a big James Vowels fan and I just love it when he’s interviewed by Sky Sports UK https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-VN6j8WH50

like he was after FP1 at the weekend. He’s honest (see my cold take) and he’s one clever cookie and he is looking waaaaaay into the future. He knows the here and now is important, but more importantly, he knows you have to build strong foundations for sustained success. Beneath the nice guy exterior is one of the most ambitious team principals you could find, but also one of the most visionary. Forget the Warriors and the Phoenix, I am firmly on the Williams bandwagon!

Gavin – Lando hunting down Max at the end of the race gave us the potential of a grandstand fight for the win that we all so desperately wanted, it didn’t quite happen but for a few glorious laps we were all enthralled by the prospect. The Red Bull was not on form this weekend and Max had a very uncomfortable end to the race as almost the entire audience was hoping for him to make a mistake. Lando said he needed another two laps to be able to make a move for the lead, but I think that is wishful thinking as Oscar Piastri in the other McLaren spent a lot of time behind the clearly slower Ferrari of Carlos Sainz and could not get past on a track that is notorious for not providing overtakes.

Speaking of overtakes, honourable mention once again to Yuki Tsunoda who did manage an overtake, past Logan Sargaent, around the outside of Tamburello! Poetry in motion. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjB5SyABlpc

 

Hot take of the weekend

Chelsea – What a difference a commentary team makes. With Sky pairing Martin Brundle and David Croft both taking a much-needed break, it was left to Harry Benjamin to hold the fort with Karun Chandhok. The two did a perfectly ample job, but it was sort of like when your dad shaves off his moustache – it sounds much the same, but something about it just seems wrong.

Aiden – Predicting that McLaren will win more races this year may not be the hottest of takes, but what if I said I think Oscar Piastri will emulate his teammate Lando Norris and reach the top step of the podium himself? He qualified P2, a place ahead of Norris, but then was subject to a three-place grid penalty for impeding Kevin Magnussen during Q1. Don’t forget that this was the first weekend the Australian had the full upgrade package from McLaren; in Miami, he had half the upgrade that Norris did. The future’s bright. The future is plenty of orange.

Gavin – Remember when Aston Martin and Fernando Alonso were the darlings of the grid, seems like a lifetime ago. Unlike his brakes, the usually reliable Fernando was not on fire and had a weekend to forget – crashing in FP3 and then qualifying in last place (though promoted to 19th as Logan Sargeant in the Williams chose to start from the pits). This underlines how important Fernando is to the team as he is single handedly dragging them along into the points so when he has a bad weekend the whole team suffers as his teammate, Lance “my daddy owns the team” Stroll, just does not deliver enough even though he has had 150 races to prove himself. Aston Martin are spending big to compete and it was important that Fernando re-sign with them but they are very much a middle of the pack outfit and will remain so until they have two drivers and a race package that can compete, consistently.

 

Cold take of the weekend

Chelsea – I’m a Ferrari fan, and I’ve heard nice things about visiting Imola (there’s a resident cat!) but I can’t remember the last nail-biter we had at the track. Do we really need two races in Italy? With F1’s popularity on the verge of a wane, and whispers that the FIA are poking around Africa, I’d love to see somewhere fresh take its place in the next few years.

Aiden – With Alex Albon signing a ‘multi-year’ contract to extend his time with Williams, and team boss James Vowles about as negative (or should that be realistic) about Logan Sargeant staying with them beyond 2024, as he’s ever been, it seems it’s almost time for Williams to announce who will finally replace the American going forward. For me, the safe pair of hands is Valtteri Bottas. He’s out of contract with Sauber at the end of this season, is a former Williams driver and also knows Vowles well from when they both worked together at Mercedes. Imagine how simple their exchange to confirm the signing would be…

“Valtteri, it’s James.  Welcome back to Williams.”

Gavin – Alex Albon must be regretting the new contract with Williams already, the team is in serious trouble and are looking very lost. The finances might be an issue that is very difficult to control but putting a wheel on a car isn’t, Alex had to coast around the track to ensure he could get back to the pits without losing said wheel and then had a ten second penalty for the incident. Williams are still looking for a point this season and will probably be looking for a new driver too as Logan Sargeant has just not been able to show anything albeit in a car that is woeful. At least a pay to drive seat would give a cash injection.

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