Race weekend review
F1 returned to Imola for the fourth round of the season; the Italian circuit was famous for producing great races. The weekend started with Charles Leclerc leading the drivers standings, which was still the case at the end of the weekend; however, the gap between first and second had reduced significantly.
The weather conditions for the weekend varied, with drivers going between full wets, inters and slick tyres. In FP1, there were plenty of spins out on track, including some from the championship leader himself. It was a Ferrari 1-2 in the first practice (the only practice before qualifying), followed by Verstappen and the two Haas drivers. Sebastian Vettel also seemed to make some headway for Aston Martin as he placed eighth in FP1.
Qualifying saw many drivers on soft tyres (others followed suit after) but by the end of it, intermediates were needed to keep the cars on track. The first red flag was brought out by Albon, whose brakes caught fire and had some debris spread across the track- ending his qualifying session early. They got back to setting fast times soon after, and this meant that both AlphaTauri’s were knocked out of Q1 in their home race alongside Ocon and Latifi.
There was a forecast of rain looming over the circuit, drivers being told they had to make their one lap count before the rain came. That is exactly what Carlos Sainz did just before he spun out and crashed, leaving him second after Verstappen who was leading. Hamilton, Russell, Schumacher, Zhou and Stroll were in the “drop zone” and were under threat of being knocked out of Q2 because the rain had started falling. The session did restart; however, the times could not be improved, so those first runs really did count a lot.
In Q3 Magnussen brought out another red flag. The track had dried slightly so it seemed intermediate tyres would finish the qualifying session. Soon, more rain poured. Leclerc went fastest, followed by reigning world champion Verstappen, only to swap it around on the next set of runs which was soon interrupted by Bottas’ crash. But there was still time for another lap. However, it would soon be assumed that no one would further better their times- this just before Norris went off the track himself with just a few second of the session remaining, causing the session to end slightly prematurely.
After the top two of Verstappen and Leclerc, Norris had set himself up in P3, alongside Magnussen in P4 and Alonso in P5 with good qualifying sessions for their teams. Ricciardo placed a solid sixth for McLaren, with Perez in seventh, Bottas in eight, and a brilliant P9 for Vettel in the Aston Martin, the first Q3 of the season for the team. Sainz would start tenth for the sprint race on the Saturday.
Many teams used FP2 to understand the cars better for the race, focusing on race pace and running with high fuel. The weather was much better in comparison to Friday, so this session would be the first test of dry weather conditions.
George Russell, Sergio Perez and Charles Leclerc made up the top 3. While it was an informative session for some teams, others struggled to get out of the garage. Valtteri Bottas and Daniel Ricciardo we’re unable to set any lap times; a similar issue arose for Lando Norris who had gone out on track but was faced with a break issue soon after.
The first sprint race of the season seemed like it would be exciting: eight points on offer for the winner and one point for eight place meant there was more to gain than last year’s sprint races.
It was Charles Leclerc who would take the lead of the race at lights out, getting a better start than pole sitter Max Verstappen. A safety car was quickly deployed after Guanyu Zhou and Pierre Gasly made contact, the former, unable to finish the sprint.
Verstappen would later go on to reclaim P1 with two laps to go after he had been following Leclerc closely along for the majority of the sprint race.
Veratappen’s Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez and Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz both gained a handful of places to make up for their original qualifying positions of seventh and tenth respectively. In that manner, Lando Norris of McLaren would drop down to fifth, while his teammate Daniel Ricciardo stayed in sixth. 
Bottas finished ahead of Magnussen in seventh, with the Haas Dane snatching the last point available from the sprint race. Alonso was in P9, ahead of Schumacher in tenth who completed the sprint on medium tyres.
Russell, Tsunoda and Vettel were 11th, 12th and 13th— the Aston Martin driver slowly going down on the grid.
It was a tough weekend for Hamilton, who moved down a place from his start position, finishing in 14th, followed by Stroll in 15th, Ocon in 16th, Gasly in 17th, Albon in 18th (who had moved 2 places from his last place start), his teammate Latifi in 19th and Zhou, who was the only driver not to finish.
Race report
Race day took place in the wet, so it was only natural to expect and be braced for a crazy day, which we definitely had.
After an excellent start to the race, Max Verstappen dominated the whole way through, eventually coming home in first place. Earning his nickname of “Minister of Defence”, Sergio Perez put up an excellent fight against home hero Charles Leclerc to finish in second, resulting in a Red Bull 1-2 on Ferrari’s home turf. McLaren driver Lando Norris capitalised on mistakes ahead in order to bring back a lucky third place podium for McLaren.
“But wait”, I hear you ask, “what happened to Ferrari?!” After such a strong start to the season, it was a surprise to see neither Ferrari on the podium at Imola. Carlos Sainz suffered another DNF this weekend following first lap contact with Daniel Ricciardo which left his F1-75 beached in the gravel (Ricciardo was able to come away from the contact and continue, eventually finishing in 18th). Charles Leclerc was set to finish in third place before a spin late in the race left him in 9th place – although he was able to recover to 6th.
It was another good weekend for George Russell in the Mercedes, with the English driver finishing in fourth place. However, teammate and former champion Lewis Hamilton had a much harder time with the car, finishing in thirteenth place, suggesting that the issues with the 2022 Mercedes are far from over.
It was a very good weekend to be Sebastian Vettel, who is a famously strong performer in wet conditions. The German driver finished in 8th place for Aston Martin with teammate Lance Stroll in 10th (another good wet-weather driver), bringing home Aston Martin’s first points finishes of the year.
Another strong weekend for Valtteri Bottas saw him drive his Alfa Romeo all the way to a fifth place finish, another strong performance for the Finnish driver who is clearly flourishing in a new team. Rookie teammate Zhou Guanyu finished in 15th place, still a good result and showing promise for the Chinese driver.
Returning Haas driver Kevin Magnussen scored another points finish for the American team in ninth place, adding to their excellent start to the 2022 season. However, Mick Schumacher was caught in contact on the first lap and was unable to recover, leaving him in seventeenth place and outside of the points once again.
We head to the inaugural Miami GP for round 5 of the 2022 season, as we’ve seen plenty of good racing so far, we’re sure there’s plenty more to come at the new circuit.
Make sure you keep an eye out for more articles in the meantime and check out our social media for updates in the F1 community!
The Fastest Sector 