Austrian Grand Prix Tag

By FIA Max Verstappen recovered from a poor start to take a brilliant Austrian Grand Prix, and to score Honda’s first F1 victory in 13 years, though the Dutch driver’s sixth career win was only officially confirmed following a stewards’ investigation into the overtaking move on Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc that earned Verstappen top spot on the podium. Polesitter Leclerc had led from the start of the race, but with a handful of laps to go Verstappen used greater pace on hard tyres to close up to the Ferrari driver. HeRead More

By FIA Charles Leclerc scored his second career pole position beating Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton by more than two tenths of a second to claim top spot in qualifying for the Austrian Grand Prix. However, the Ferrari driver will be joined on the front row by Red Bull’s Max Verstappen after race officials handed Hamilton a three-place grid penalty for impeding Alfa Romeo’s Kimi Räikkönen in Q1. Ferrari led the way in the opening stages of the first session, with both Leclerc and Sebastian Vettel using medium tyres. Leclerc topped the order in theRead More

By FIA Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc went quickest in final practice for the Austrian Grand Prix, edging Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton by 0.143s with Valtteri Bottas third in the other Mercedes. Leclerc made steady improvements during the session before bolting on a final set of soft tyres from a qualifying simulation that saw him become the only man to breach the 1m04s barrier with a P1 time of 1:03.987. Hamilton couldn’t quite match that pace and the title leader finished the final practice session in P2 with a time of 1:04.130. ThatRead More

By FIA Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc went quickest in an incident-packed second free practice session for the Austrian Grand Prix that saw red flags shown for c crashes involving Red Bull’s Max Verstappen and Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas. Bottas topped the timesheet early in the session on medium compound tyres and as the field began to make the switch to soft tyres for their performance runs Verstappen crashed out. The Dutchman was still on the medium tyres with which he began the session when he lost the rear on the entry toRead More

By FIA Valtteri Bottas edged team-mate Lewis Hamilton by just under two hundredths of a second to take his second consecutive Austrian Grand Prix pole position and the fifth pole of his career in a tight qualifying session at the at the Red Bull Ring. Sebastian Vettel was third for Ferrari ahead of team-mate Kimi Räikkönen. Q1 saw Mercedes quickly to the fore with Hamilton and Bottas trading times on ultrasoft tyres before Hamilton settled into P1 with a time of 1:04.080, just under a tenth of a second aheadRead More

By FIA Sebastian Vettel set the fastest ever lap of the Red Bull Ring to edge Lewis Hamilton by just under three hundredths of a second in final practice for the Austrian Grand Prix. The Ferrari driver powered past the record set in Valtteri Bottas in 2017 qualifying with around 20 minutes left in the session. With three DRS zones to work with and ultrasoft tyres onboard Vettel posted a time of 1:04.070 to eclipse Bottas’ benchmark by 0.181 seconds. Championship leader Hamilton got close to pipping Vettel shortly afterwards,Read More

By FIA Mercedes continued to lead the way in practice for Sunday’s Austrian Grand Prix, with Lewis Hamilton again leading a one-two for the defending champions, just under two tenths of a second ahead of team-mate Valtteri Bottas. Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel was third, 0.236 behind title rival Hamilton. The Silver Arrows had looked comfortable in the morning session and in the second 90-minute session Hamilton and Bottas were again to the fore. Hamilton’s best time of 1:04.579 was set on soft compound Pirelli tyres early in the session on anRead More

By FIA Lewis Hamilton topped the first free practice timesheets at the Austrian Grand Prix weekend got underway at the Red Bull Ring, with the champion leading a Mercedes 1-2 ahead of Valtteri Bottas, with Red Bull Racing’s Max Verstappen third at the Anglo-Austrian team’s home event. The Dutch driver was the first to set a lap time in the session and he was also an early spinner when he momentarily dropped the rear wheels of his RB14 into the gravel at Turn 4. His car pirouetted through 360 degreesRead More

By Joey Barnes, Editor-in-Chief Following an investigation, Pirelli have come to the conclusion that Sebastian Vettel’s tire failure at the Austrian Grand Prix was due to debris. The four-time Formula 1 champion suffered a right-rear blowout along the main straightaway at roughly 200 mph while leading race before  hitting the inside wall and coming to a stop in the middle of the track near the entrance of Turn 1. Ferrari was running Vettel with the supersoft tire compound and had completed 27 laps when it failed, but the Italian tireRead More

By Joey Barnes, Editor-in-Chief Nico Hulkenberg saw one of the best qualifying efforts of his career turn into a rough day at the office in the Austrian Grand Prix. The Sahara Force India driver delighted on Saturday in qualifying and started the race in second alongside polesitter Lewis Hamilton. However, Hulkenberg had a slow start off the line and quickly faded to fourth in the opening laps, before strategy and pace pushed him further down the running order and eventually retiring in the closing laps of the race. “I’m prettyRead More