Formula 1: Michael Lamonato joins Fox Sports News to discuss Jack Doohan making his F1 debut for Alpine in Abu-Dhabi.
You’d have been openly and mercilessly mocked had you said at the start of the season that you expected McLaren and Ferrari to be battling for the constructors championship in Abu Dhabi .
But then RBR tripped up just three rounds in, with Max Verstappen retiring from the Australian Grand Prix with a brake fire just three laps into the race. Oscar Piastri was also competitive despite using an old-spec car, having Norris’s number all weekend. It could so easily have been him claiming his first win were it not for an unfortunately timed safety car.
Including his four points from Imola, the Mexican has scored just 49 points since, making him directly responsible for Red Bull Racing’s failed title defence.McLaren’s big upgrade brought it into the top three, but Ferrari was fast enough to retain its status as next best behind RBR, thanks in part to its famous victory in Monaco.
It was the start of a long few months in the wilderness for Ferrari that would see it come close to falling out of title contention. With Pérez finishing a typically ineffectual seventh, McLaren slashed its championship deficit to 51 points. McLaren locked out the front row, but Leclerc beat them both with a perfectly executed strategy. Ferrari won the round by three points.
They started ninth and 10th and finished the race fifth and seventh, exhibiting race pace that might have won them the grand prix had they started further up the grid. Mexico City was similarly impressive, with Sainz winning from pole on a totally different style of circuit. Though Norris pipped Leclerc late for second place, Piastri’s run from the back of the grid to eighth ensured another big swing in Ferrari’s favour, this time worth 19 points.
Ferrari was left to finish third and fourth. Still ahead of McLaren in sixth and seventh after — the title leader struggled to get its tyres switched on in the frigid conditions — the Scuderia’s swing was restrained to just 12 points. Regardless of the controversy surrounding how race control dealt with the debris on the pit straight, a harsh penalty was undoubtedly deserved for what was fundamentally a safety matter.
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