Greetings to all F1 enthusiasts worldwide. It is our favorite day of the week, Raceday Sunday. We are in the nation of Saudi Arabia, at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit, the fastest street circuit on the planet. This is the second race of the season out of twenty-three. It was an amazing start to the Championship season and it continued into the second race as drivers have to respect this tight and fast demon track, especially bend 22 along with 3 DRS zones. But before we leap into the race. Let us go over some track facts.
Track facts
The Track is called the Jeddah Corniche Circuit. This is a street circuit and the fastest one of the season. The first Grand Prix here was in 2021, it’s a new one. The length of the circuit is 6.174 km. There are fifty laps on this track. The race distance for the race is 308.45 km and the lap record is held by Lewis Hamilton (2021), with a time of 1:30.734.
Let’s do a quick review of the first two days before the race.
Day One
FP1; In practice 1 at the top of the timesheet, we had two Red Bulls, two Aston Martins, and a Mercedes. “Has anyone seen one of the red prancing horses, Ferrari?” Well, both racing cars had their power unit changed, not a good start to the season. Max Verstappen of Red Bull Racing topped the timesheet with a time of 1:29,671 which was a new track record. Sergio Perez of Red Bull Racing followed with a time of 1:30.100. Fernando Alonso of Aston Martin finished next with a time of 1:30.315, followed by Lance Stroll of Aston Martin with a time of 1:30.577. Rounding up the top five was George Russell of Mercedes with a time of 1:30.771.
FP2; In practice 2, for the top five on the timesheet we saw another midfield Team enter the fold. Max Verstappen of Red Bull Racing finished first with a time of 1:29.603, followed by Fernando Alonso of Aston Martin with a time of 1:29,811. Sergio Perez of Red Bull Racing finished third with a time of 1:29.902. In fourth was Esteban Ocon of Alpine finish with a time of 1:30.039 and to round out the top five we saw George Russell of Mercedes finish with a time of 1:30.070.
Day Two
FP3; Day two began with another track record, first on the timesheet was Max Verstappen of Red Bull Racing finishing with a time of 1:28.485. In second we saw Sergio Perez of Red Bull Racing finish with a time of 1:29.098. Next we saw two Aston Martins, finishing in 3rd was Fernando Alonso with a time of 1:29.483 and Lance Stroll finishing in fourth with a time of 1:29.509. Round off the top five was Lewis, Hamilton of Mercedes finishing fifth with a time of 1.29.568. An impressive day for Aston Martin and Red Bull.
The day finished with qualifying for the grid position. Max Verstappen got the 15th position on the grid as he had gearbox issues.
P1 – PEREZ, P2 – LECLERC, P3 – ALONSO, P4 – RUSSELL, P5 – SAINZ, P6 – STROLL, P7 – OCON, P8 – HAMILTON, P9 – PIASTRI, and P10 – GASLY.
Race Day Sunday
What a start to the 2nd race of the season. Alonso of Aston Martin “the Lion”, pounced on Perez of Red Bull Racing and took the lead at the beginning of the race, only for Perez, a Red Bull, to hunt down the Lion, Alonso of Aston Martin. Max Verstappen of Red Bull Racing in the 15th grid position, hunted and swept his way into 2nd on the Podium, taking advantage of the circuit, with slipstreams from all three DRS zones. Remarkable and fearless! Alonso finished 3rd but was handed two penalties, which are then reversed after further review. Unwarranted! Alonso drove brilliantly for his 100th F1 career podium placement. Also equally impressive we saw three midfield teams score practical points, Alpine with 6pts, Haas with 1pt, and Ferrari with 14 pts.
Rookie Watch
Zero points for all three newcomers this early season. Logan Sargeant of Williams had 0 points and finished in 16th place. Nyck De Vries of Alpha Tauri got 0 points and finished in 14th place and Oscar Piastri also got 0 points and finished in 15th place.
Podium
1st – Sergio Perez of Red Bull Racing (1:21:14.894)
2nd – Max Verstappen of Red Bull Racing (+5.355s)
3rd – Fernando Alonso of Aston Martin (+20.728s)
Fastest Lap
The fastest Lap went to Max Verstappen of Red Bull Racing (1:31.906)
Quotes of the Day
I will leave with these quotes of the day!
“We’ve got two great drivers, we talked about it in the briefing; you are free to race but keep it clean.” Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin
”What a start to the season, probably unthinkable I need to review, the start, I made a mistake so when they told me, I knew I needed to drive even faster. It’s hard Grand Prix but I push all the way through.” Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin
Up Next
Melbourne Grand Prix in Australia from March 30th – April 2nd 2023.
Leave a Reply