Perez can't even cheat right – Up and down at 2023 Austrian GP
From top to bottom, from the foothills to the peaks, Max Verstappen embarrassed the rest of the F1 grid in all departments during the 2023 Austrian GP weekend
Perez tries to focus on the positives (there aren't any)
Grand Prix Photo
The Max Verstappen masterclass rolled on in Austria, not only schooling the entire opposition but also his own team-mate.
As well as showing Sergio Perez how you properly shove someone off the road in the sprint race, he also placed his car in the right position each time to get the DRS advantage to make his car’s superiority even more stark when slicing through the field on Sunday, something the Mexican singularly failed to grasp.
Perez did manage to labour his way to second in the race from 15th, but it’s not that impressive when your car is several parsecs per lightyear faster than the next-fastest.
The 18 other competitors, fighting, squabbling, crashing into each other, were made to look pretty amateur in comparison, as the FIA’s track limit ticker went off the scale, presumably sending F1’s remote ops centre into near meltdown too.
We’re sure that when this hub of rule-crunching excellence was conceived, getting the VAR lines out to examine the position of Esteban Ocon’s raggedy front right medium Pirelli tyre for what must have felt like 72 times in one race was what they envisaged…
Here’s what the hills were alive with at the 2023 Austrian GP:
Goin’ Up
Saturday Stroll
A proud Alonso looks on
Aston Martin
Lance Stroll managed to fend off his mentor/minder Fernando Alonso in the sprint with some brilliant car positioning.
Maybe the senior Aston driver was just checking up on all the lines he’s been tutoring his young charge as he weaved from one side to the other just behind?
Hulk the hero (for a bit)
Hulk finally gets a top three (in the Sprint Shootout)
Nico Hülkenberg yet again showed how Haas’s choice in hiring him was a stroke of mild good judgement. Can’t quite have seen Schumacher putting it third in the sprint shootout.
In race pace terms though, it was familiar territory. Just about hung on for points on Saturday, but it all fell apart again on the Sunday.
Sainz on a roll
Might be better just trying something else Carlos – Extreme E?
Ferrari
For perhaps the first time in his Ferrari career, Carlos Sainz looked like he properly had a handle on the prodigious pace of Charles Leclerc. Shame about the Scuderia strategy then…
McLaren’s new meteor
Norris wonders whether to go full-time with Quadrant after risking his life for another middling points-paying position
Grand Prix Photo
Feels like McLaren is perpetually either waiting for the next upgrade or benefitting from one for one race before falling back again, but Austria was a highlight.
Lando Norris took the new and improved McLaren missile to an impressive fourth place, seeing off both the Mercedes cars.
Goin’ Down
Traditions
Ferrari doing what it does best – undoing its own good work
Ferrari
Sainz clearly faster in the early stages, with a chance to catch Verstappen in the lead. What do the Maranello peeps do? Leave him third, stuck behind Leclerc, and then bizarrely pit him on the same lap during the VSC, dropping the Spaniard back into the pack. What could have been…
Mind the run-off
Put the Astroturf.. riiight… there!
Understandable that the Red Bull Ring has to compromise between running F1 cars (which can handle gravel) and MotoGP bikes (which can’t), but surely a better deterrent can be found to stop drivers abusing track limits at the pinnacle of motor sport?
Install a bit of Astroturf round the requisite outer track edges for the weekend, then take it off? The kind you used to slip and slide about on during Physical Education lessons at school. That’d teach em.
Clogged up
That’s now how you do it Sergio
Red Bull
Another race, another instance of the clog being on the other stump for Verstappen.
Moaning about being put on the grass by his team-mate in the sprint, a few hundred feet from where he once drove into Leclerc to help himself win the race in 2019.
Poor Perez though, even when he tries to play dirty he can’t do it right – tries to shove Verstappen into the scenery at the start of the sprint, who still manages to immediately slipstream him and get back past.
Max showed you how in 2019 Sergio, you have to actually drive into them (see below)!
Leclerc 🆚 Verstappen for victory? 🤩@Charles_Leclerc and @Max33Verstappen had one of their most famous duels in Austria back in 2019… who wants to see that again?!#AustrianGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/8hRzRQtKs7
— Formula 1 (@F1) July 5, 2022
De Vries disaster
We imagine De Vries tried not to make any metaphorical career connections with an almost out-of-control smoking Red Bull-branded vehicle hurtling towards the ground
Grand Prix Photo
Mr Motivator himself Helmut Marko said prior to Austria that Nyck De Vries’ career hung in the balance, adding that Christian Horner didn’t want him in the first place.
The Dutchman then had his second-worst finish of the year with 17th in Austria on Sunday after qualifying last. Clearly did the trick.