After the trials and tribulations of Baku, the paddock was at the Circuit Paul Ricard to kick off the first of many triple headers in the 2021 season. Safe to say this was the best French Grand Prix since it came back onto the calendar in 2018, but the bar really is below the floor level as it still wasn’t a classic. Anyway, enough of me ranting about my pre-existing negative opinion of the track, here are the top of the class contenders and struggle bus riders from Le Castellet.

Top of the class:

Max Verstappen – Qualifying: 1^st | Race: 1^st (+FL)

Max can count his lucky stars that Hamilton wasn’t able to take advantage of his Baku tyre explosion as he held on to a slender four-point lead in the Championship heading into France. But on a track that suited Mercedes to a T in 2018 and 2019, Max well and truly flipped the form book last weekend.

The Red Bull driver took his fifth pole position with a time of 1:29.990, over two tenths quicker than Hamilton, his closest rival in the Championship. At the start, Max went in deep into turn 1 and conceded the lead to Lewis, having to settle for P2 for the first stint.

However, Red Bull triggered the all-important undercut on Hamilton by pitting on lap 18, one lap before Mercedes stopped the 7-time World Champion. Max retook the lead after a stellar out lap and held off several DRS attempts from Hamilton into the Mistral Chicane.

Then the team pulled an Uno reverse card and elected to pit Verstappen for a second time on lap 32, dropping from the lead to 4^th, he made quick work of Pérez and then set on the Mercedes pair. He breezed past Bottas after a rather limp defence into the Mistral Chicane on lap 44. Max pulled the same move past Lewis on the penultimate lap to ultimately win the race, replicating what Mercedes and Lewis did at the Spanish Grand Prix back in May.

On that penultimate lap, Max also set the fastest lap, therefore growing his Championship lead to 12 points, whilst Red Bull now sit pretty in P1 in the Constructor’s Championship with a 37-point lead. With his third victory of 2021, Max’s scintillating form is giving Mercedes some headaches – and with a double-header on one of his best tracks, the Dutchman could have a handsome lead going forward.

Sergio Pérez – Qualifying: 4^th | Race: 3^rd

The Mexican seems to be settling into life at Red Bull quite well, and Sunday highlighted one of his best assets to any F1 team, tyre saving. Sergio ran to lap 24 on his mediums before switching to the hard tyres, which enabled him to hunt down Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas ahead.

He got by Bottas on lap 49 at the Mistral Chicane, this time around the outside. Although he was investigated for leaving the track and gaining an advantage, no further action was taken and Pérez came home to take a valuable P3.

Pérez is doing precisely what the doctors ordered by taking points off Mercedes and closely following Max for the most part. Hopefully for Red Bull, Pérez has built the confidence to start placing that Red Bull ahead of Lewis, although that is easier said than done.

Fernando Alonso – Qualifying: 9^th | Race: 8^th

After a really strong performance at Baku, Alonso continued his fine upturn in form with some more solid points at Alpine’s home race. The two-time World Champion outqualified teammate Esteban Ocon by over two tenths in Q2 to make the top 10 whilst Ocon had to settle for 11^th.

During the race, Alonso was pretty much battling where he started, until he pitted on lap 18. He would put some strong moves on both Ferraris to rise up from 10^th to 8^th and that is where he finished – but was less than two seconds behind McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo at the chequered flag.

Whilst his Championship position doesn’t change, and Alpine finds themselves in a lonely battle for P7 in the Constructor’s, Alonso is quietly reminding the grid of his talent and skill behind the wheel and continues to have the upper hand on Ocon in spite of the latter getting a new multi-year contract before his home race.

George Russell – Qualifying: 14^th | Race: 12^th

Mister Saturday also had a pretty decent Sunday, as he arguably had one of his best performances in the Williams. Whilst 12^th isn’t his best finish, what makes it more extraordinary is that all 20 cars reach the chequered flag, with George finishing in front of the likes of Ocon and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.

Sure, there are still areas to improve, tyre warming seems to be an issue as he dropped four places in the opening stages, but some strong overtakes on teammate Nicholas Latifi and AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda sent George on his way to his best finish in 2021. More importantly, Williams regains 9^th in the Constructor’s Championship from Haas, which could be significant for 2022 and beyond.

Honourable mentions this week go to Pierre Gasly and Daniel Ricciardo for their respectable performances this weekend. Gasly once again putting the AlphaTauri in the top 6 in qualifying and a 7^th place finish was the best he could do considering McLaren’s far superior race pace.

Ricciardo joins this list after struggling in the last few races, but he looks to finally have found confidence in his papaya machine with a strong drive to 6^th whilst having a less than superior strategy to teammate Lando Norris.

The struggle bus:

Yuki Tsunoda – Qualifying: DNQ | Race: 13^th

Tsunoda had a surprisingly good race at Baku after stuffing it in the wall in Q3, but he wasn’t so lucky this weekend.

A third qualifying crash resulting in a red flag left Tsunoda requiring a pit lane start after AlphaTauri made a number of parts changes. Yuki backed into the wall at turn 1 and caused significant damage to the rear of his car on his first flying lap.

The rookie finished the race in 13^th, but considering Gasly is scoring points whilst Tsunoda is making recovery drives, the pressure will only start to mount if this continues.

Charles Leclerc – Qualifying: 7^th | Race: 16^th

The French Grand Prix is one that Charles would like to forget in a hurry, but I fear that the Scuderia’s tyre issues could sting the team on more occasions than just last Sunday.

Charles had decent pace this weekend but found himself outqualified by Sainz on Saturday. Ferrari’s decision to pit so early (lap 14) failed as they found themselves being overcut but Ricciardo. By the time Ferrari committed Leclerc to a two-stop, the Monegasque was already out of the points and he would come home a lowly 16^th.

Esteban Ocon – Qualifying: 11^th | Race: 14^th

Not the way that Ocon wanted to celebrate his new multi-year contract, a contract which brought any rumours of Alpine luring Pierre Gasly away from the Red Bull family to an end.

Although he was outqualified by Alonso, starting 11^th gave him fresh tyre choice. This should have helped him the race, but it did not. Whilst the Aston Martins made a 1 stop work and secured a double points finish in spite of Sebastian Vettel and Lance Stroll starting 13^th and 19^th respectively, Ocon sunk in his second stint and finished a distant 14^th.

A home race to forget for Ocon, but this shouldn’t take away from a number of solid drives he has had so far in 2021, but the points still favour Alonso at this early stage of the season.

The races come thick and fast now as the paddock hops across the Alps to Austria. There F1 will have a second year of hosting back-to-back rounds at the rather picturesque Red Bull Ring. Subtle brag about having been there, but it is the prettiest track on the calendar so I am certainly not mad about two rounds there.

The Styrian GP is up first on 26^th-27^th June with the Austrian GP the week after, I highly recommend tuning in to see if Red Bull can make home advantage count in their Championship fight. There even could be some inclement weather heading to Spielberg, but you should always take F1 weather forecasts with a fistful of salt.