A return to the Red Bull Ring, nestled in the Styrian mountains, must have felt a little bit like coming home for Red Bull Racing. Especially as Max Verstappen’s enthusiastic Orange Army made their comeback, perhaps with a few too many canisters of orange smoke.
Still, once the smoke was cleared up, an eventful race awaited us. Read to find out whether your favourite driver made it to the top or the bottom of the list:
Top of the class:
Mick Schumacher – Qualifying: 7th | Sprint: 9th | Race: 6th
Beast mode unlocked! His first points in Silverstone must have been the confidence booster he needed, because baby Schumi looked unstoppable in Austria. Then again, even in the junior series Mick was known to be a little bit of a slow starter, only finding his feet at about the year-and-a-half mark – and guess how long he’s been in F1 now…? exactly!
Whilst he had an excellent points haul, his most memorable action of the weekend must be his battle with Hamilton in the Sprint. He lost it to the faster Mercedes in the end, but the way he kept the 7-times World Champion behind lap after lap was truly impressive. Although his Turn 9 overtake on Magnussen during the race deserves some kudos too.
The German has effectively silenced the critics (for now), but it is key to keep this momentum going, because you are only as good as your last race and there are plenty of weekends left on the calendar. Part of this falls on Haas as well, because whilst they had the most well-thought-out car to begin with, they haven’t yet brought along any upgrades, and if they want to stay in this midfield battle, they will have to keep up with the paces of their rivals.
Charles Leclerc – Qualifying: 2nd | Sprint: 2nd | Race: 1st
On Friday and Saturday, the Monegasque couldn’t quite catch up to Max Verstappen, but on Sunday his main rival was battling with heavy tyre degradation on the green track, meaning that Charles Leclerc could take full advantage. Take advantage he did, as for the majority of the race the Monegasque looked to be in full control as he overtook his Championship rival three times over the course of the 71 laps.
Only towards the end of the race that control began slipping, as trouble began to brew on the horizon for the fast but fragile Ferrari. He was battling a stuck throttle in the closing stages of the race, which is as dangerous as it sounds. One could question whether they should have waved the meatball, but someone who won’t be questioning that decision is Charles, because he gets to take home the biggest trophy this weekend.
Esteban Ocon – Qualifying: 5th | Sprint: 6th | Race: 5th
If you would ask Esteban, he will probably say that his weekend was quite boring. He drove around in no-mans-land, but in the best possible way.
He maximized the package consistently throughout the weekend, meaning that he couldn’t quite keep up with the top dogs but was fast enough to comfortably drive away from the rest of the midfield. A season-best fifth is not too shabby for his 100th Grand Prix.
Honourable mentions…
The first honourable mention of the day goes to McLaren. They had a difficult start to the weekend, with Daniel battling a DRS-issue and Lando encountering a brake-by-wire issue, but they rounded out the weekend by a double-points finish.
The second honourable mention goes to the 2022 regulations. They have given different teams some trouble, especially around porpoising, but they have delivered on their promise; closer racing. The five-car battle during the race – with Lando Norris, Fernando Alonso, Kevin Magnussen, Mick Schumacher and Zhou Guanyu starring as the main characters – proved this.
The struggle bus:
Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari
The difference between Sainz’s results last week and this week were like night and day. DNFing your first race after your race win must be devastating, and the Spaniard certainly looked crushed when he took a seat next to the track after having to stop his car.
Understandably so. Because when the Ferrari race engineers manage to keep it together when they’re having a good day, it’s the Ferrari Engine which can’t handle the pressure. It failed in spectacular fashion, causing his fourth DNF in 11 races.
It also solidified his second-driver status in Ferrari for the 2022 season, despite the cause of the DNF being out of his hands. If Ferrari still want to win a drivers’ championship that is, because Charles Leclerc will be their best bet. Then again, Ferrari strategy works in mysterious ways…
Fan behaviour
It has been brewing for a while; fans have never been kind to each other on Twitter and rumours of unacceptable behaviour from fans on track have been trickling through the grapevine in the last few Race Weekends. This weekend it truly crossed a line, and whilst we are talking about a minority here, the minority are getting louder.
Accounts of homophobic and racist abuse coupled with sexual assault reflects really poorly on the majority of fans who created a buzz in the Styrian mountains, and whilst the racing did the talking on track, for a lot of fans the events that unfolded at the 2022 Austrian Grand Prix left unwanted memories.
It was good to see the sport taking a stand, even a disjointed one, in calling out on some deplorable behaviour towards sections of fans across the weekend. What we need to watch out for, however, is demanding for drivers to apologize on behalf of their fanbase. Such calls have been made for Hamilton when Verstappen was booed in Silverstone, and now again for Verstappen to apologise for members of the Orange Army misbehaving in Austria. Let’s focus on getting drivers to actually acknowledge their own faults first and foremost, and let’s not make apologies and excuses empty words by forcing drivers to apologise for behaviour on behalf of others.
In terms of the fans who misbehaved, do better.
Sergio Pérez – Qualifying: 4th (13th after penalties) | Sprint: 5th | Race: DNF
Sergio’s weekend went downhill from the moment he was penalised for exceeding track limits at turn 8 in Q2. It was strange that they waited until after qualifying to penalise him, as with others they deleted laptimes during the session on several occasions. The long wait simply meant that Checo went through Q3 unnecessarily and threw away a few sets of tyres because of it. Then again, over the line is over the line, so there is nothing to say about the penalty itself.
He drove a decent recovery during the Sprint, collecting a few points on the way, but in the race things went downhill once more. In a collision at turn 4 with George Russell, for which Russell was deemed at fault, he was tipped into a spin and ended up in the gravel. He got his car back on track, but it later turned out that the damage was substantial enough for him to be forced to retire the car, ending his 100% classified finishing record at the Red Bull Ring. He has now dropped behind Leclerc to third in the championship standings, but he has plenty of races to redeem himself still.
Alfa Romeo
Valtteri Bottas – Qualifying: 12th | Sprint: 10th | Race: 11th
Zhou Guanyu – Qualifying: 18th | Sprint: 14th | Race: 14th
The second pointless finish for Alfa Romeo in as many weeks. They were close, but the chequered flag fell a single lap too late for Bottas, as he ended up losing his 10th position (and the point) to Fernando Alonso.
Zhou Guanyu’s bad luck streak continues, as he had his car stall on the formation lap for the sprint on Saturday, forcing him to start from the pits, whilst on Sunday he just couldn’t make the hard tyre work, meaning that he was pretty uncompetitive.
Then for dishonourable mentions…
Best to be kept short, because it’s likely that neither team like to think back to their weekend. Both Aston Martin and AlphaTauri finished outside of the points. Gasly was compromised because of the penalties he received, whilst Tsunoda struggled for pace. The boys in green did not look particularly competitive all weekend, and the little trips out to the gravel in both the sprint and the race certainly didn’t aid Vettel in his quest for points.
Next weekend will give the drivers and their teams a brief reprieve, before we will be meeting them again at Le Castellet on the French riviera. Lights will be going out at 2pm UK time on Sunday 24th July as drivers look to impress in the penultimate round before the Summer break.
