The Emilia Romagna Grand Prix proved far more exciting than many had predicted after last year’s yawn-fest at Imola, thanks to a deluge of rain before the start.
Max Verstappen took a commanding win for Red Bull-Honda, which again looked to have the fastest car on the 2021 grid, while Mercedes-AMG’s Sir Lewis Hamilton recovered fantastically from a slide into the gravel on greasy asphalt. The podium was completed by British youngster Lando Norris, who drove superbly for McLaren-Mercedes.
Here we round up the major talking points from the second round of the 2021 F1 World Championship.
We’re in for a title battle
Not since 2016 have F1 fans been truly treated to a title battle, due to the utter dominance of Mercedes. But the rule changes for 2021, despite them being minor, have benefited the cars that subscribe to a high-rake aerodynamic philosophy and hampered the low-rake cars – which are only the Mercedes and Aston Martin.
The Red Bull again looked to be the fastest car at Imola, and Verstappen made up for his near miss in the Bahrain season opener by brilliantly outdragging from third on the grid his team-mate Sergio Pérez and Hamilton, to lead into the first turn. From there, Verstappen never looked back. There was a heart-in-the-mouth moment as he nearly lost it before the restart, but Verstappen held on and didn’t let that shake his confidence.
Hamilton versus Verstappen in closely matched machinery over the course of a season is something that F1 fans have long desired. Imola seemed to confirm that we’re finally going to get just that. Sparks: be ready to fly.
Bottas feeling the pressure
Having never been anywhere close to Hamilton in his years at Mercedes, Valtteri Bottas is widely expected to lose his Mercedes seat at the end of this season, unless he really pulls it out of the bag. At Imola, he couldn’t even open the bag’s zip. He qualified just eighth in the second-fastest car, didn’t make up too many places and then had an almighty crash – followed by some in-person aggression.
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So,Imola is boring hmmm, only one reall passing place etc, and yet, when we get to Monaco, it's all this steeped in history blah blah blah, Senna and his Miracle wins, or how abou Macau or the new American Gp next year, some of these tracks have own grown F1, and the new ones are races round urban areas and gambling establishments, aren't they a bit of a snore too?
Re high and low rake.
My understanding from having read something on the F1 app is that all the cars floors are higher at the rear than the front, jacked up at the rear so to speak, high rake like redbull are higher at the rear than a low rake Mercedes, which is closer to horizontal with the ground.
Now I'm no aerodynamicist so I don't understand it all but apparently the Merc relies on its longer floor and wheelbase, which is the longest of all the cars, for some of its aero performance, and the new rule removes or does something to the rear floor, this I assume negatively affects the Merc because it's losing some aero floor that the high rake cars don't find as essential.
There are loads of interesting articles on this on the web. I think it's hypothesis though as no-one has access to test both types of floor to compare, but it would make sense if the goal.was to peg back Mercedes advantage.