A look back at the Portuguese Grand Prix. The Portimao circuit suggested a lot

Hamilton’s world record breaking, Vettel’s woes or Albon’s end at Red Bull? This race weekend really gave a clue and answered many questions. We’ll answer some of them in this article and of course also recap the highlights from Sunday’s Grand Prix.

Sunday saw the next race of this year’s Formula 1 season at Portugal’s Portimao circuit. It wasn’t just on the race track that things were happening, as after this race we have clarity on several other issues regarding the future of individual drivers, teams and records.

SOMETHING ABOUT THE RACE WEEKEND

At the Portimao circuit, the teams were faced with a big unknown. Throughout the weekend, the engineers and the drivers themselves were getting to know the track. Thanks to low temperatures, changes in weather conditions, circuit structure and a lot of tyre work, chaos reigned in the early laps.

The drivers who started the race on the soft compound had the best start. It was this that propelled Carlos Sainz to the front of the race. The drivers who started on medium compound were unable to warm up the tyres sufficiently during the opening lap and dropped down the order. In particular, Hamilton and Bottas lost significantly after the start.

However, the McLaren drivers were able to start in first and fourth place. Kimi Räikkönen even gained ten positions at the start and climbed up to sixth! However, the medium-hard tyres managed to warm up over the next few laps and the Mercedes were able to regain their first two positions. The soft tyres, on the other hand, soon began to lose performance.

After that, the race pace pretty much settled down. On lap 18, Stroll Landa closed on Norris’ McLaren on the exit of turn one, causing an accident and costing Norris a potentially good result. Stroll had dealt with the same issue in practice when he collided with Max Verstappen in this way. Lance Stroll not only failed to learn his lesson, but even ignored the black and white flag warning, whereupon he received a time penalty totalling ten seconds.

He then pitted his car on lap 54. After 66 laps, Lewis Hamilton won the race, with Bottas in second and Verstappen in third. Behind him, Charles Leclerc crossed the line one minute and five seconds behind. A great result was recorded by Pierre Gasly in the Alpha Tauri, who finished in fifth position. Sainz finished sixth, having overtaken seventh-placed Sergio Pérez on the last lap.

The race was not going well for the Renaults. Ocon finished eighth, Ricciardo ninth. The last point for tenth place went to Sebastian Vettel, who pushed Räikkönen back to an 11th place out of the points. The aforementioned Norris finished thirteenth behind Alexander Albon. George Russell also had a good result, finishing behind the McLaren of Lando Norris in his Williams.

A NEW WORLD RECORD

Lewis Hamilton set a new world record for the most wins in his career with this 92nd win, breaking Michael Schumacher’s record. ” The move to Mercedes was a fateful moment for me at the time and now I can only thank everyone who has walked alongside me on this journey, especially Petronas and Mercedes themselves,” Hamilton said in a post-race interview.

It should be noted that Mercedes’ dominance in recent years has been truly overwhelming and the record is deservedly broken. The fact remains that although Lewis has not signed a new contract with Mercedes, there are no signs of his departure and it can be said that it is only a matter of time.

Hamilton has also made it known that he is not about to sign a lucrative new contract at a time when many people are losing their jobs.

VETTEL’S CONTINUING WOES

But who is clearly not enjoying this season too much is four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel. That’s because Ferrari has cut him off from new car development and important conferences about the car’s characteristics. Although Binotto dismisses the conspiracies about the different conditions and claims that they have exactly the same car, the comparison of the two drivers’ performance is certainly thought-provoking.

For example, in a radio communication during Saturday’s qualifying for Sunday’s race, Vettel told the team that he didn’t have his tyres ready for qualifying at all, unable to warm them up for the required performance. “It’s not just a defeat, it’s like a different league. I’m trying everything I can. I think the bikes I’m running, although I’m happy with them, are still too slow. At the moment I can’t do more than take what’s in me.”

ALBON’S PERFORMANCE

End of story. That’s probably what awaits Alexander Albon soon. Red Bull has already put the knife to his throat, so to speak. After a long defence by Horner himself, Red Bull has to admit that Alex is not up to the task at the moment. He has already been in the same situation and conditions with Max Verstappen several times. This race and the next one are to decide his tenure at Red Bull.

With him still more than half a second behind his teammate, the end will probably be inevitable. In Portugal, he held midfield in the race, finishing as high as 12th outside the points.

HISTORIC CIRCUITS

This interesting but very unusual season has so far brought us circuits that are not normally raced on. However, many experts and F1 fans see this as a big positive. In particular, Portimao, the Nürburgring and Imola, which awaits us this weekend, are great circuits.

So it would be great to see them on the Formula 1 calendar again. We’ll see in the coming months how their inclusion in the calendar turns out. For example, fans would love to see the aforementioned Nürburgring on the calendar instead of the boring Russian GP at the Sochi circuit.

Source: F1 Live, F1 sports.cz, Twitter.com