Jeddah was an unbelievable second race for the season, especially the first couple of laps were extremely nerve-wracking. Starting with the formation lap where Pierre Gasly already had a gear problem, didn’t even arrive at the actual race start and had to instantly retire the car. What a sad weekend for the Alpine driver!
As a McLaren and Ferrari fan my worst moment of the weekend was the start of the race, when the on Friday predicted jump start by Lando Norris became reality. The jump start was discovered and reported by the good eye of George Russell. Luckily, this accident was checked and dismissed by the FIA with a warning for Lando, because the GPS signals didn’t work at that time. But not just Lando had Problems at the start, as Charles Leclerc struggled with wheel spin and lost the battle over the 1st Place to the World Champion Max Verstappen.
After the Drivers put themselves in a good race position, there was our first Safety-Car situation. There was already a lot going on in the first few rounds, when Stroll came to close to a wall, leading to a broken front axle. This caused him to lose control and crash in to the wall, resulting in his DNF. Good News is that the Canadian driver is okay. His crash led to an incredible safety car deployment and nearly all drivers used their chance to box and get new tires. There was drama going on with a lot of nearly unsafe releases and one unsafe release from Perez, that was punished with 5 seconds. One of the drivers that didn’t box was Lando Norris. He used his chance and took the first place for a while. He led the rest of the grid behind the safety car and the British driver even had the chance to lead the race for a couple of laps! After the DRS got enabled, it was possible for Max to overtake and put a big gap between him and the rest of the grid.
Besides all of our experienced and regular drivers, there was something special going on in the Ferrari garage. Carlos Sainz unfortunately needed an operation due to his inflamed appendix. On the one hand, bad luck for Carlos Sainz on the hot weekend in Saudi Arabia, on the other hand good luck for F2 driver Ollie Bearman! The Ferrari junior driver woke up on Friday morning with exciting news. He finally gets his chance to drive a qualifying and a full race in an F1 car. He presented himself very well. All the other drivers really appreciated him in the paddock and supported him on and off the track! It was even possible for him to score Points in his first F1 race as one of the youngest Ferrari drivers at 18 years old! He ended the race on place 7, which is an excellent result for the British F2 driver Ollie Bearman. Let’s see what the future holds for Ollie, maybe we will see more from him in F1. Even our 3rd place Charles Leclerc was talking about him like a proud older brother and that there will be a bright future for Ollie.
Carlos Sainz was already seen in the Paddock on Sunday, although his walk didn’t look very healthy, but we hope we’ll see him back in the car for the Australia Race. All in all, he is doing well again. But there wasn‘t just drama on the grid, but also off the grid, with the Red Bull garage struggling with their team spirit. There were interviews with Dr. Helmut Marko that he wants to and probably has to leave Red Bull. This doesn‘t come without consequences, as there is a clause in Max Verstappen‘s contract that when Dr. Helmut Marko leaves the Red Bull Team, Max can leave Red Bull before the official Contract ending. He already expressed himself thinking about another team if Dr. Marko leaves. Another sign for tension in the team was, when Christian Horner was not part of the supporting Red Bull team on Max Podium. Is this possibly related to the serious rumors against Horner? We will hear more in the couple of next weeks.
Congratulations to our podium sitters Max, Checo and Charles!
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