The hell of Lusail
It’s been almost a week since Qatar Grand Prix, one of the hottest (if not the most torrid ever) ever held in Formula 1. During and after the Lusail race, in fact, many drivers felt various kinds of ailments, with Sargeant even raising the white flag by voluntarily withdrawing from the GP for extreme conditions. The name of also appeared in the list of those who suffered physical difficulties Fernando Alonsobut for a particular reason.
The burning seat
The Spaniard in fact asked his team for some water to throw inside the cockpit during the pit stop in order to cool his seat, which became too hot already in the first third of the race. A request that Aston Martin was unable to accept, given the sporting regulations which prohibit an action of this kind as it is considered to add weight to the single-seaters. In any case, now that the nightmare is over for everyone, controversies have arisen, with related investigations launched by the FIA, relating to temperatures that were decidedly too high, to which other problems have been added such as the G forces suffered by the pilots on a track which also features fast corners, and stints of a maximum of 18 laps each due to excessive tire wear. An aspect that pushed the participants to always push to the maximum, without managing their energy in this way.
The differences with the Sprint and the proposal
Yet, except for this Pirelli tire issue, Saturday’s Sprint race hadn’t been that terrible for the drivers in terms of environmental conditions. While it is true that this event has a lower number of laps than the Sunday GP, it is equally clear that the conditions were not so extreme: “It was a surprise to be honest – Alonso himself explained to the media – because Saturday wasn’t so bad, maybe it was windy or somethingwhile in the race we lost that ventilation, so it was extreme”. For all these reasons, the two-time world champion has launched a proposal to prevent such episodes from happening again: “We have to see if there will be a solution in the future and if, in such extreme conditions, we may decide to delay the departure or otherwise – he added – this was definitely one of the most difficult races of my career. When we raced in Malaysia, in Sepang, I remember that the conditions were very extreme, as well as in Bahrain in 2009, when I think it was 41°. That one was extremely hot, and this one is definitely in the top three hottest I’ve ever raced.”
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