Luke’s Weekend Take – Dutch GP 2023

We head now into Saturday and FP3 starts very wet as it was raining at Zandvoort so in FP3 we see the blue striped tyres as everyone is on the full wets to start, with the track being wet it was proving tricky for drivers, even the Championship leader Max who is known for his skills in the wet got caught out a bit on turn 3 but manages to save the car from hitting the barriers. Kevin Magnussen wasn’t so lucky when he lost it on the same turn and hit the barriers damaging his front wing and Steiner was not at all impressed given that this was the new spec again. This incident brought out the Red flag for the first time in FP3.

Turn 3 wasn’t the only turn, which was catching out drivers in the tricky conditions, Turn 1 caught a few drivers out especially the Ferrari pair, Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz got caught out in the runoff to turn 1 into the braking zone, in fact in FP3 we see Leclerc go to the runoff 3 times with Sainz and Alonso taking the detour once. Luckily no one hit the barrier and managed to keep going, although Esteban Ocon did hit the barrier with his front wing a bit, but it wasn’t a significant enough hit to actually damage his wing.

We see 2 more incidents in FP3 where we saw Zhou Guanyu get beached going into the last corner and beaches his Alfa Romeo bringing out the Red flag once more, Zhou didn’t pick up any damage, but Marshalls needed to recover his car from the gravel for the session to continue. And in the closing stages of FP3 we see Liam Lawson have a slight scare on the penultimate corner and barely touches the barriers taking no damage to his car, given the fact that Lawson stopped facing the wrong way, he had to wait for any oncoming traffic to pass before he turns his car around and get going again but the stewards didn’t know his car was still running as they brought out the Red flag for the 3^rd time in FP3. In FP3 we see Max Verstappen topping the charts followed by George Russell and Sergio Perez.

We head now into qualifying, and the rain has stopped but the track is still very much damp, and cars start coming out on the inters. In Q1 drivers were mainly seeing where the grip was on track and test the limits. Turn 1 was still very tricky as it catches out both Max Verstappen and Nico Hulkenberg as they both go through the gravel and avoid any damage. Later in Q1 we see Oscar Piastri and Carlos Sainz come together as Sainz was coming out of the pits while Piastri was coming round Turn 1 and Sainz just veers left as he didn’t see Piastri and Oscar had to take avoiding actions by braking and going on the grass a bit. Late into Q1 the rain starts coming down again, so the race was on with all the drivers to get their best lap in with an evolving track. In Q1 we end up losing Zhou Guanyu, Esteban Ocon, Kevin Magnussen, Valtteri Bottas and Liam Lawson.

The rain didn’t come down for long and the track started drying out so quick in Q2 and the crossover point between inters and slicks was in sight for all the drivers. In Q2 there was nothing too eventful however we do have a shock exit in Q2 as we lose Lance Stroll, Pierre Gasly, Lewis Hamilton, Yuki Tsunoda and Nico Hulkenberg. This shows you how important it is for teams to get the timing of their timed laps perfect with a quick evolving track as both Hamilton and Stroll had quick enough cars to get into Q3.

The track had dried out so much that the FIA enabled DRS for Q3, and 5 drivers come out straight onto the softs and the other drivers did one out lap and went back in for the softs as the track was too dry for inters. Even though there was a dry line for the slicks, drivers still needed to be very careful to ensure they don’t go onto the wet part as Logan Sargeant found out as coming round Turn 2 Sargeant loses the rear and wrecks his Williams in the barriers bringing out the Red flag again. The start was delayed so that the marshals can repair the barriers but that also meant that the track is drying way more as the sun was now out. Once the session started again drivers were getting their laps in but the Red flag fancied another outing as Leclerc puts his Ferrari in the barriers as he understeers at Turn 9. This only left enough time for drivers to have one last push lap once the session restarted. Once we restarted it was all about timing and it was the home hero who came out on top with Max Verstappen on Pole followed by Lando Norris, George Russell, Alex Albon, Fernando Alonso, Carlos Sainz, Sergio Perez, Oscar Piastri, Charles Leclerc and Logan Sargeant forming the top 10.

With all these Red flags on the leadup to the race leads me to believe that we will probably have a Red Flag should there be an incident which unfortunately for me this will not go well for by betting predictions.

What do you think will happen tomorrow for the race? I think with some big names starting further back we will have a good race on our hands apart from Max sailing into the sunset and getting another Grand Slam.