The success of Valtteri Bottas at Istanbul Park decrees the sixth different winner of the season, a number that Formula 1 has not seen since 2012 and which further certifies the quality of the current championship. Mercedes thus wins the second consecutive race, but at the same time is forced to hand over the lead of the drivers’ standings to Max Verstappen. However, that achieved by the Silver Arrows was only one of the many half-way victories, intermediate in fact, which took place on Sunday in Istanbul.
The Turkish Grand Prix was one of the most complicated from the point of view of the preparation of the teams since the beginning of the year. In fact, the Istanbul Park presents challenges inherent in the design of the track, given the alternation of straights at times more guided and the presence in equal measure of high and low mileage curves, even more than in the other tracks visited after the summer break. This feature alone would have been enough to complicate the set-up work, as the engineers had to balance the different behavior of the car between the fastest and slowest corners, as well as guaranteeing a sufficient level of downforce without compromising the extension speed.
Added to this were a series of circumstances that made the search for balance a real headache for the teams, witnessed by the sudden change in the aerodynamic configurations of the cars between free practice sessions and in some cases even before qualifying. The surface treatment of the asphalt in the weeks preceding the event in fact significantly increased the grip of the track, reaching the highest seasonal levels and taking the teams by surprise, which had instead prepared for the Grand Prix by predicting less grip. With the high grip of the track the initial setups prepared by the teams proved to be inadequate and the balance of the cars has been decompensated. The majority of the drivers therefore complained of a strong understeer, with the rear end enjoying greater grip than the front which tended to slip, consuming the front tires and in some cases triggering the graining.
However, choosing the right level of downforce proved to be just as complex. While increasing the front load would have helped to counteract understeer and reduce wear on the front tires, on the other hand it would have meant a greater vertical transfer of energy to the tires, on an already particularly severe track on this front. In the race pace simulations on Friday in dry conditions it was seen just how, in addition to wear, the tires also showed some blistering, symptom of excessive overheating induced by vertical stresses. The choice of the aerodynamic configuration was therefore particularly delicate, having to combine balancing needs with the management of two different tire wear mechanisms, which required conflicting corrections. Added to this were other variables represented by the rapid evolution of the track, the uncertainty of the weather forecast and finally the rain, which turned the work of setting up into a real undertaking.
Mercedes: victory of merit
In this context, Mercedes and Valtteri Bottas emerged, the latter able to be ready on the day when his teammate fighting for the title started from the rear. Just Lewis Hamilton appeared annoyed via radio for the stop in the final which cost the reigning champion two positions and five important points in terms of world championship. However, the Englishman found himself in a situation similar to that experienced by Charles Leclerc, with the intermediate rubbers now worn to such an extent that the underlying carcass can be seen, with the risk of a failure and a withdrawal that would have cost much more than the points lost with the stop.
Once the new intermediates were mounted in the final, both Leclerc and Hamilton suffered a clear delay compared to the surrounding cars in the laps immediately following the stop. In fact, the scenario seen on other occasions was repeated, in which the track was still damp, but not sufficiently wet to require that the blocks of the intermediate tires dispose of the water to avoid aquaplaning. In these conditions, the grooves of the wet tires represent a handicap, as they reduce the contact surface of the tire on the ground, limiting its grip. In Istanbul it was seen just like immediately after the stop the drivers struggled to find the pace they had before the pit stop, having to reach precisely that optimal condition of temperature and wear of the blocks of new tires.
The success of the Mercedes in any case was anything but smooth, since the Brackley team also had to work a long time before finding the optimal balance. It is proof of this the change of the rear wing in the transition from FP1 to FP2, then replaced again for FP3 before a further correction before the entry into force of the parc fermé regime with the start of qualifications. In the end, the team differentiated the choices between the two drivers, with Lewis Hamilton disputing the race with the specification used in FP1, while Bottas mounted the wing of the FP2.
However, the Mercedes experiments did not focus exclusively on the rear. On the contrary, at the front there was an alternation on Friday between the traditional front wing, later confirmed for qualifying and the race, and a new specification, more discharged but more efficient, characterized by an upper profile dug in the center and then declining towards the top on the outside. The new version was not used in the race, although it is not known whether this is due to the greater load required at the front due to the widespread understeer, if any correlation problems were found or if rather from the beginning its use in addition to data collection was not foreseen. The next Grand Prix will be important to clarify whether Mercedes will actually have an important additional tool available to refine the set-up during free practice.
Red Bull unbalanced
Half victory also for Red Bull, which limits the damage in a complicated weekend and even regained the top of the drivers’ standings, but on the other hand it did not capitalize on the opportunity of Lewis Hamilton’s retreat on the grid to conquer the step higher than the podium. In contrast to what was seen in the very first seasonal races, the RB16B is confirmed as the most difficult car in the search for balance between the two single-seaters protagonists of the world championship challenge. In the past, the car had already shown a tendency to understeer, highlighted even more in the Turkish weekend when the rival cars also ran into the same problem due to the conditions of the track.
However, Milton Keynes’s car showed a real imbalance between the aerodynamic balance at high speeds and the mechanical balance that emerges at low distances, partly inherent in the car and partly induced by the set-ups chosen by the team to counteract the frequent understeer. On Friday Max Verstappen also complained of sudden snaps, losing the rear in the faster corners. The unforeseen track conditions certainly did not help the team to contain understeer at low speeds, but in the next races Red Bull is called to find a better balance. If the defeats between Monza and Sochi were partly attributable to the penalties on the grid and the slight superiority of the Mercedes on the straight, the Anglo-Austrian team will instead have to prove competitive on the more driven tracks such as at Zandvoort, having to compensate for the delay accumulated in the extension with the cornering speed.
Red on
The Scuderia di Maranello was the protagonist of another victory in the middle, to be understood with the success savored around the halfway point of the race before the stop of Charles Leclerc and the fourth place finish. The positive signs for Ferrari from the Turkish weekend in any case go beyond having shortened the distance from McLaren in the standings to just 7.5 points. The SF21 proved highly competitive on an already very technical and complete track, moreover both in dry and wet conditions and in both short and long distance.
On Friday, the question arose as to why the Red, which most of all in the season had experienced difficulties in getting the front tires up to temperature, was in such a state of form in a context in which all the cars suffered from understeer. . However, the widespread understeer of the competition was attributable to balance problems, deriving from the set-up still being adjusted to cope with the greater grip of the asphalt than expected. The high level of grip, combined with the high aerodynamic load and the intense stresses of the Turkish track, instead helped Ferrari where it suffers most., transferring energy to the roofs to quickly warm them up.
The SF21 was therefore competitive even with intermediate tires, managing with Leclerc to keep the pace of the leaders from the first laps of the race. The difficulties for the Monegasque were instead in qualifying with slick tires in wet track conditions, with a relatively low set-up that did not help to warm the tires. In fact, even Ferrari repeatedly alternated the two rear wings available between FP1, FP2, FP3 and qualifying. In the end, Sainz competed in the Grand Prix with the most loaded wing used since FP1, while Leclerc opted for the lighter spoon wing experienced in FP2. For the Monegasque, the decision to unload the aerodynamics was aimed at improving the speed on the straight and also at preventing any blistering on the tires in anticipation of a dry race.
The race, on the other hand, was held entirely with intermediate tires, but the car appeared equally well balanced and with an excellent pace even over the long distance. The new hybrid part of the power unit introduced in Sochi helped in terms of internal temperatures and energy consumption, allowing prolonged use of electric motor generators thanks to their better efficiency. The merits of the performance in Istanbul, however, are not attributable solely to the novelties of the hybrid, as the car as a whole appeared well balanced.
Another encouraging sign for the Scuderia di Maranello comes from cynicism with which the qualification of Carlos Sainz was managed despite the retreat on the grid. The dispute in Q1 made it possible to relegate Daniel Ricciardo’s McLaren to the back of the grid and subsequently to offer Charles Leclerc an important wake in the last attempt in Q2 which earned him access to Q3. Already in Sochi in qualifying, Ferrari had been among the most reactive, being among the first to have fitted slick tires in Q3 to have enough time available to get them up to temperature. Some perplexities in the management of the Istanbul race concern rather the attempt to go all the way with Leclerc without replacing the tires, a choice that in retrospect cost the podium, but which could also have resulted in the first victory in two years now.
Finally, in Turkey it has been an excellent review AlphaTauri, sixth at the finish with Gasly behind Hamilton. The Faenza team has finally managed to realize the potential of the car, poorly exploited in the last two rounds, shortening Alpine by seven points in the standings and moving to twelve points behind.
In two weeks we will be back on track in Austin, on a track that the Circus has not visited for two years. In the recent MotoGP Grand Prix, it emerged that the track is dotted with bumps and irregularities, an aspect that, although it is not as incisive for cars as it is for motorbikes, could still be one of the central themes of the next world championship round.