F1. Japan 2023 Review

By Chelsea Wintle and Gavin Huet

Driver of the day

Chelsea – It’s Oscar Piastri for me. He qualified second, and while his start and his race pace didn’t compare with his teammate Norris, he managed to hold his position in third. A podium in your rookie season is nothing to sniff at, and even more impressively, it was his first time racing at Suzuka.

Gavin – Oscar Piastri – a podium in his first time at Suzuka in his first year of F1 having out-qualified his teammate Lando Norris. The race started with Oscar putting Max Verstappen under pressure whilst Lando tried to sneak around the outside before Max had to cover that move – great teamwork in action and it very nearly worked for the McLarens. For a driver still learning this was a very good result capping off a very good weekend. On this trajectory he will be competing for titles sooner rather than later.

Moment of the weekend

Chelsea – The battle between the two Mercedes was one of the highlights of another race with the victor was essentially a foregone conclusion. It also led to one of the more bizarre team orders I’ve seen, where Russell in 5th was unequivocally instructed to switch positions with Hamilton in 6th, which led them to finish the race at 7th and 5th respectively. I’m sure there were some very intelligent strategic minds behind the call, but to the less initiated it seemed like they just spat out two much-needed points in their constructor battle with Ferrari.

Gavin – Lewis Hamilton overtaking Fernando Alonso on the inside of the legendary 130R corner! Nerves of steel and ability all coming together for a fantastic move – I could watch that all day long. Who says there is no real racing any more?

https://twitter.com/F1/status/1705902648631914902

Hot take of the weekend

Chelsea – On the same weekend that Red Bull cruised to another constructor’s championship, their drivers had very different experiences. While Verstappen sailed to a victory that proved Singapore was but a blip, Perez had an absolute nightmare. First, he failed to lock out the front row with Verstappen, then was slow enough off the line to nudge Hamilton’s Mercedes. On pitting for a new front wing he was penalised for speeding, before clumsily tackling Kevin Magnussen and retiring twice (more on that later). I can’t see Perez losing his seat for 2024, but his downward trajectory this season is hard to ignore.

Gavin – On a weekend where we saw teams such as Mercedes, Alpha Tauri, and Alpine racing each other, sometimes a bit harder than other times, the Red Bull team showed just how one dimensional they are at the moment. To be fair, they have, ahem, Max-imised, their potential and wrapped up the constructors championship for the season already, but it feels like all that work is being done on one side of the garage. The hilarity of Sergio Perez retiring not once, but twice in the race was comical, and yet it was uncomfortable too as you could feel the shame emanating from behind Sergio’s visor. Would having Daniel Ricciardo there be better for the team, more than likely the answer is “yes”, but does Danny Ric want to be a wingman or a title contender? Or should Red Bull promote from within and let a rookie (Liam Lawson perhaps) be the wingman who can learn from Max and be a contender in the future? I guess part of the answer will be how Danny Ric does in the Alpha Tauri next season.

Cold take of the weekend

Chelsea – Drivers can retire twice? I’ve only been watching F1 since 2016, but this is my first memory of it, and like all rules I don’t understand, it seems stupid. Surely the point of a penalty is that the driver is actually penalised, and if you’ve already retired then there’s not much in the way of consequence. Either waive the penalty when the driver retires or carry it over to the next race, but having drivers rejoin a race just to serve one out seems a tad farcical. Rant over. Also, Sargeant out and Lawson in? Have I said that yet?

Gavin – All that talk of Liam Lawson going to Williams and then Logan Sargaent has a weekend to forget. Never mind who eventually gets that seat, it is the fact that there will be a seat that is the news. Williams team principal James Vowles said that Logan was using an older package, and this is because new parts have been harder to source as their rate of attrition has been higher – in other words Logan has damaged too many of the new parts and therefore they have to use the old ones. Williams must surely be looking elsewhere and maybe if there weren’t a couple of North American races coming up then they would probably already have a new driver in the team. As I have said many times before, these drivers are the top in the world and there is no shame in not being able to compete at that level every weekend, however F1 is a results based sport and business, and this means teams have to adapt to whatever has happened around them in order to compete. And yes, this does mean drivers lose their spots even if sometimes it feels unfair and harsh.

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