SUTTON
Advantage Red Bull as Mercedes fails to find
an answer in France
Was Mercedes wrong to stick to a one-stop strategy in last weekend’s French Grand Prix? Given the straightline speed of the Red BullHonda (a remarkable thing to see given where Honda was not so very long ago), it made sense to leave Lewis Hamilton out.
Time and again Hamilton has shown his ability to eke out tyre life, and the fact that Max Verstappen only retook the lead on the penultimate lap proved it was worth a try. What was strange was that the team also left Valtteri Bottas on old rubber.
Quite apart from the argument that splitting your strategies makes sense, one of the Finn’s consistent weaknesses against Hamilton has been that Bottas burns through tyres much faster. He also stopped earlier than Hamilton at Paul Ricard and wanted to make a second pitstop. Surely it would have made sense to bring Bottas in and allow him to try to attack in the closing stages. It would have at least given him a chance against Sergio Perez, who did what Red Bull needed.
As Alex Kalinauckas shows in our report on page 16, it was an enthralling race that shows the 2021 championship battle is very close – and that Red Bull is slightly ahead. Both Verstappen and Hamilton have made mistakes this year, but Max’s off-road excursion at the start did not cost him victory. Red Bull is now 4-3 ahead of Mercedes in terms of 2021 wins and the next two races are at the Red Bull Ring, where a power advantage could be very useful indeed.
Kevin Turner Chief Editor kevin.turner@autosport.com
NEXT WEEK
1 JULY F1, WRC and BTCC Action from Styria, the Safari Rally and Brands,
plus W Series
COVER IMAGE FIA Pool
PIT & PADDOCK 4 Teams hit back at Pirelli tyre findings 6 Ocon gets long-term Alpine contract 8 Bamber in Porsche for Le Mans 10 Kristoffersson with Ekstrom for WRX 13 Styrian Grand Prix preview 14 Opinion: Alex Kalinauckas 15 Feedback: your letters
RACE CENTRE 16 French GP report and analysis 32 Wehrlein denied again in Formula E 38 IndyCar: Penske’s bad luck strikes again 42 World of Sport: FIA Formula 3; GT World Challenge Europe; DTM; Pure ETCR; Australian Supercars; Super Formula; MotoGP
INSIGHT 50 W Series season preview
CLUB AUTOSPORT 63 Chandhok joins Motorsport UK board 64 NP01 car makes UK debut in new series 66 MGCC to run meetings despite setback 69 Opinion: Stephen Lickorish 70 National reports: Silverstone; Cadwell Park; Oulton Park; Knockhill; Brands Hatch 76 How to improve your driving
FINISHING STRAIGHT 78 What’s on this week 80 From the archive: 1983 European GP 82 What could have been: Harvey’s return
SUBSCRIPTION OFFER 26 Special deals for Autosport
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24 JUNE 2021 AUTOSPORT.COM 3
