Silverstone Sprint and Qualifying

Catch up on a busy weekend at Silverstone as we break down FP1, the Sprint race and qualifying for the British Grand Prix. 

Transcript

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Good morning, racing fans. This is Mohan coming to you with the usual update, this time ahead of the British Grand Prix at Silverstone. Even before we got to the main race, it's already been a fairly busy weekend. We've had Lewis Hamilton setting the early pace in front of the British crowd, an incredibly close fight for sprint pole. Kimi passing Hamilton to win the sprint race, and then Kimi backing that up by taking pole position for the main race as well. Ferrari looked genuinely quick. Mercedes has been strong but not completely comfortable. McLaren is struggling more than expected, and Red Bull's encouraging form from Austria really hasn't translated to this circuit. So let's go through everything that has happened so far and look how the main race is shaping up. Because this is a sprint weekend, the teams only had one hour of practice before heading directly into the competitive running. This is a return of the sprint race to the Silverstone Tech after being a part of the initial sprint race in 2021. So this session as a result makes FP1 very important as it only gives teams very limited time to experiment with setup and test different directions or recover if the car comes off the track track outside its ideal operating window. So for FP1, Hamilton looked immediately looked to be the most comfortable. He topped the session session with a 1 minute 29.260, finishing just over two tenths ahead of Kimi. Charles Leclerc was third, George Russell fourth, and Oscar Piastri 5th. Hamilton then carried that pace into this qualifying for the sprint race. This was one of probably one of his strongest qualifying performances for the season. He was fastest in all three parts of the qualifying session and then produced a lap which really mattered in SQ3. The final segment effectively became a one-lap shootout. Antonelli briefly moved to the top, but Hamilton responded with a 1 minute 28.376 to take sprint pole by 11 thousandths of a second. There's basically nothing around a lap, 11,000ths is basically nothing around a lap of Silverstone and just showed how closely matched the Ferrari and Mercedes teams are over one lap. Verstappen qualified third, around 10 tenths behind, with Leclerc fourth and Russell fifth. At the other end of the field, Bierman missed SQ2 just by one hundredth of a second, while Cadillac and Aston Martin occupied the bottom of the grid as they have done in previous events. But the main story here was Hamilton. He had top practice, led every stage of sprint qualifying, and then held his nerve in a final session shootout to take pole in front of the roaring Silverstone crowd. Then we move on to the actual sprint race. Hamilton made a very assertive start to the race. He moved immediately across to cover Antonelli and made sure that Mercedes couldn't take the lead in the opening corners. Behind them, though, it had become quite chaotic. The McLaren's launched well as Verstappen dropped backwards. Norris briefly passed Antonelli for second, but Antonelli quickly reclaimed the position. Russell then passed Norris. Norris fought back. Verstappen became involved and the order kept changing during the opening laps. Hamilton led, but Antonelli never really allowed him to escape too far. The Mercedes remained within striking distance, and by the middle of the sprint, it was fairly obvious that Antonelli had slightly more sustained pace and he was able to make that move come lap eight. He stayed close enough through the opening part of the lap and used the car's boost system and powered past Hamilton through the hangar straight. Once he got ahead, the race changed very quickly. He immediately started opening the gap and moved himself outside Hamilton's effective attacking range. Lewis continued pushing and later set the fastest lap, but he never got close enough to launch a serious counterattack. That meant Antonelli eventually crossed the line 2.745 seconds ahead of Hamilton, claiming the first sprint victory of his Formula One career. One more thing to tick off for him in this fantastic season that he's having. It was a very composed performance, but he didn't panic when Hamilton squeezed him at the start. He recovered quickly after temporary losing second to Norris and he waited for a clean opportunity rather than forcing a move too early. This shows that he has learned significantly from his start at the Austrian Grand Prix and he's been prepared to remain patient and work his way through the race as such. Behind the leaders, Norris recovered from sixth on the grid to finish third. He had a strong opening lap and then kept mat then managed to keep George Russell behind him during the closing stages. Leclerc took fifth, Verstappen finished sixth, Piastri seventh, and then Liam Lawson claiming the final point in eighth position. So overall the sprint gave us a reasonably clear picture moving into the main race. And that picture was that Mercedes had the best sustained press through Antonelli. Ferrari were very close, and Hamilton was certainly competitive, but he couldn't quite keep up with the Mercedes once Antonelli was able to use the cars for electrical deployment. Then we moved on to qualifying for the main race, which will happen tonight, Melvin Town. It took place in quite gusty conditions, and the wind made the cars particularly unpredictable through Silverstone's quick corners. George Russell provided the first major incident when he locked up at Loughfield and ran through the gravel and lightly struck the barrier. Initially, it looked like that was going to be the end of his qualifying session, but he was able to get the car out of the gravel trap back to the garage where Mercedes were able to replace his front wing and send him back out again. Isaac Hajar was a surprise leader in Q1. Behind him Liam Lawson and then Charles Leclerc. The difficulties for, as we know, for the teams at the back, Aston Martin and Cadillac were noticeable again, and they brought up the rear. O'Conn and Colapinto were the other two drivers who didn't make the cut in Q1 as well. Moving on to Q2, Antonelli came out in front in this session with Charles LeClerc and Hamilton taking up second and third position. McLaren found themselves under pressured in this session. PS3 and Norris both progressed, but neither looked comfortable in this session. And they still seemed to be unable to match the outright performance of Mercedes and Ferrari. Perstapan was also very unhappy with the behavior of his car. He made it through to Q3, but the car looked difficult to manage, particularly when the wind changed direction across different parts of the circuit. Then we moved on to Q3. It actually looked like it might become another battle between Hamilton and Antonelli. Hamilton briefly went fastest before Antonelli moved into provisional pole, while Russell slotting into second and giving Mercedes a temporary front row lockout. But the final laps changed the order again. Antonelli produced a 1-minute 28.111, going particularly well through the middle sector and improving enough to secure his fifth pole position of the season. The clerk delivered an excellent effort to move into the front row, finishing just 0.175 seconds behind Antonelli, and Hamilton qualified third just ahead of George Russell, who came in at fourth. Hajar qualified an impressive fifth ahead of Norris in sixth. Verstappen could only manage seventh while Thia Street eighth, and the two racing bull cars of Lindblad and Lawson complete in the top ten. This actually effectively means that all four Red Bull and racing bull cars were able to finish in Q3 and qualify in Q3, which is a very impressive performance overall, despite the actual positions that they qualified in. This was a very strong result for Antonelli, especially after winning the sprint earlier in the day and carrying that form into qualifying. And he has as a result of that actually shown that he spaced over one lap and over the shorter race distance. But the big question is whether he can convert that into a victory in the main race tonight. So how is the main race actually shaping up? So the the major story is obviously Antonelli against Ferrari. And he he would actually enter this race as a slight favorite ahead based on what we saw in the sprint race. The situation is more complicated this time because he actually has two Ferraris behind round him rather than just one. And it's actually Leclerc's performance was quite impressive given the previous weekends that he's actually had and our discussion about the fact that he's particularly potentially down on confidence quite a bit. So this actually was quite a crucial result for him. Russell is very is extremely placed placed well in fourth position, but his weekend actually hasn't been as smooth as Antonelli's, and he has overall appeared to be slightly less comfortable in the car, but he also remains close enough to take advantage of any trouble involving the leading three cars. McLaren and Red Bull both have a lot of work to do given the positions that they actually finished in. But as I mentioned before, from an interesting point of view, both Red Bull cars finishing in the top qualifying in the top 10, and both racing bull cars qualifying in the top 10 is very is a very good result for Red Bull overall. And hopefully that actually translates into the races as such. So what does that actually what do we actually need to watch come the main race? So the main one of the main things obviously is can Antonelli hold that leader at the start and control the race? In the way he controlled the second half of the sprint, and whether he's actually learned from his impatience in Austria and is prepared to work his way through for a result. The second item in this is whether Ferrari actually have the long pace to challenge Mercedes or was Hamilton's inability to stay with Antonil in the sprint race a warning of what might actually happen in the longer format. Thirdly, can Leclerc turn a front row start into a serious victory challenge? And he definitely needs a result like that. But we will find out tonight in Melbourne time. What we do know is that the main contenders are very closely matched over one lap, and whether they can actually translate that into a longer race distance, we'll be waiting to see. So it'll be a fascinating race, and I'll certainly be watching it with great interest, even though it'll be midnight in Melbourne time tonight. When we do start, it'll be a very late start, very late finish. And to actually see the battle between Mercedes and Ferrari and whether Red Bull is and McLaren are able to feature feature in that conversation come come race to race time. Thank you for listening to this update. Enjoy the race and we will catch up with you on the other side of this race. Have a good day.