#BrazilianGP: @ValtteriBottas claims #F1Sprint pole position. #F1 #SaoPauloGP
Valtteri Bottas, #77, Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team, F1 W12 EQ Performance, celebrating after winning the 100km Qualifying Sprint Race to claim pole position, Qualifying Sprint, Formula 1 Heineken Grande Premio De Sao Paulo 2021, Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace (Interlagos), Sao Paulo, Brazil. Image credit to Sutton Images. Bottas Brazilian GP Pole, 2021 Brazilian GP Sprint, Sao Paulo GP Sprint.
Bottas Brazilian GP Pole – Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas beat Red Bull’s Max Verstappen to claim pole in the Brazilian GP 100km Qualifying Sprint Race, with Lewis Hamilton recovering to fifth from starting last.
When the 24-lap sprint began, Bottas’s soft rubber appeared to give him the edge off the line, as he powered alongside Verstappen after it looked as the Finn reacted slightly slower to the Red Bull.
Bottas was side-by-side with the Dutchman at the apex of the first corner and pulled ahead, as Verstappen became rapidly under-pressure from Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz, who had also been given a set of C4 red side-walled softer compounds and used them to pass Red Bull’s Sergio Perez for third place at the opening turn.
Sainz was all over Verstappen down the second straight and at the fourth corner right hander where the pair went alongside each other, with the latter going off track and rejoined behind the Ferrari, Verstappen crunching the kerbs at the edge of the run-off area, kicking up a plume of dirt.
But Verstappen was able to to chase after Sainz as Bottas pulled clear up-front, behind the Spaniard for a few tours before using DRS assistance to reclaim second place with an easy move on the inside of the Ferrari at turn one on lap four.
Verstappen charged after Bottas, posting a series of fast laps as he cut the leading Mercedes gap, which at one stage with Sainz behind reached 2.5 seconds, to under two seconds as they quickly moved clear of the Ferrari – the front-two the only drivers lapping in the 1:12 bracket.
The Dutchman continued to eat away at Bottas’s advantage as the sprint continued, getting within DRS range on the 15th tour.
But the Red Bull driver was unable to to close enough over the next few laps and fell back beyond one second at the Milton Keynes based-squad told Verstappen to “bide your time”.
Heading into the final laps, which saw heavy clouds popping up behind turn four, Verstappen did charge back into DRS range, but the Dutchman never got close enough to make a move on the Mercedes and finished 1.170’s seconds adrift of the Finn, as Bottas clinched his second F1 Sprint race victory of the season.
Bottas therefore starts the Sao Paulo Grand Prix from pole position in-front of Verstappen – the reverse of how the pairing lined-up in the sprint.
In third, Sainz kept Perez at bay for the rest of proceedings, wounding up 18.723 seconds off of Bottas.
In the field behind, Hamilton, on the C3 yellow side-walled medium tyres, gained five places on the opening lap, with the seven-time world champion rapidly moving into 14th place at the start of lap two.
He made steady progress from there, using DRS assistant to get by AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda and then Alfa’s Antonio Giovinazzi and Alpine’s Fernando Alonso to reach near the top ten by the start of the ninth tour.
But with McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo running in tenth place, much as it was the case for Bottas at last weekend’s Mexico City GP, Hamilton struggled to pass the McLaren.
At the end of the 12th tour, Hamilton got close enough to the customer Mercedes-powered MCL35M with DRS and pulled ahead on the outside into turn one, quickly moving clear to hunt down Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel who was running ninth.
After a couple of laps behind Vettel, the Briton powered through in a near similar overtake to pass Ricciardo and then easily charged by Alpine’s Esteban Ocon and AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly to hit seventh place on lap 17.
From there, Hamilton had a couple of tours in free air as his next victim was Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, unlike Sainz, the Monegasque-youngster was running the C3 mediums, with Hamilton getting into the 1:12’s bracket whilst the leaders dropped back into the 1:13’s.
On lap 20, Hamilton was right with Leclerc, and made the move stick using DRS to blast by the Ferrari on the inside line into turn four to claim sixth and chase after McLaren’s Lando Norris, who flexed his muscles past Leclerc rising up from seventh on the grid.
Hamilton overtook is fellow British-compatriot as the final tours entered the history books, eventually coming home in fifth place with a solid move on the McLaren’s inside at the beginning of the last lap.
Hamilton eventually finished 20.872 seconds behind his pole-winning team-mate Bottas with Norris, Leclerc, Gasly and Ocon rounding out the top ten.
Hamilton will start tenth in Sunday’s Sao Paulo Grand Prix due to hid grid penalty for taking on a fresh Internal Combustion Engine.
Ricciardo qualified in 11th place and ahead of Alonso 12th and Giovinazzi 13th.
The other Aston Martin of Lance Stroll will line up 14th on the grid and in-front of Tsunoda who was 15th and Williams Racing pairing Nicholas Latifi and George Russell who were 16th and 17th respectively.
The only incident of the sprint was the tangle between the two Alfa Romeo’s of Giovinazzi and Kimi Raikkonen, colliding at the turn one apex on the second tour of the sprint, after they sandwiched Alonso in the early fight for 11th.
Raikkonen suffered a lock-up and he went towards Giovinazzi on the inside of the right-hand corner, with the latter’s front-right touching the 2007 world champion’s left-rear and spinning him into the run-off area at the rim of the track.
Over the rest of the sprint, Raikkonen recovered two positions to finish 18th in-front of the Haas F1 Team pairing Mick Schumacher and Nikita Mazepin.
You can watch the highlights of the Formula 1 Heineken Grande Premio De Sao Paulo 2021 Qualifying Sprint Race at the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abFGhepdBWw
2021 Brazilian GP Sprint – The Top Three
2021 Brazilian GP Sprint Pole – Valtteri Bottas, #77, Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team, F1 W12 Performance:
“The start was key for me, to have a great start. We gambled on the soft tyre. It was tricky in the end but Max struggled to follow in certain corners.”
2nd Place – Max Verstappen, #33, Red Bull Racing-Honda, RB16B:
“The start itself wasn’t the best but we were also on the harder compound which didn’t help. The pace felt good but around here once you close up you can’t really pass. We try again tomorrow.”
3rd Place – Carlos Sainz, #55, Scuderia Ferrari, SF21:
“The start was great, I needed one – starts have been an area I wanted to improve. The first three corners I just wanted to attack, it was tight with Checo and Max but we made it work. I managed to keep Checo behind, the pace was good and we managed on the tyres.”
2021 Formula 1 Heineken Grande Premio De Sao Paulo Sprint Qualifying Results Classification (24 Laps)
| POS | DRIVER | TIME/RETIRED | PTS |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 29:09.559 | 3 | |
| 2 | +1.170s | 2 | |
| 3 | +18.723s | 1 | |
| 4 | +19.787s | 0 | |
| 5 | +20.872s | 0 | |
| 6 | +22.558s | 0 | |
| 7 | +25.056s | 0 | |
| 8 | +34.158s | 0 | |
| 9 | +34.632s | 0 | |
| 10 | +34.867s | 0 | |
| 11 | +35.869s | 0 | |
| 12 | +36.578s | 0 | |
| 13 | +41.880s | 0 | |
| 14 | +44.037s | 0 | |
| 15 | +46.150s | 0 | |
| 16 | +46.760s | 0 | |
| 17 | +47.739s | 0 | |
| 18 | +50.014s | 0 | |
| 19 | +61.680s | 0 | |
| 20 | +67.474s | 0 |
https://www.formula1.com/en/results.html/2021/races/1104/brazil/sprint-results.html
2021 Brazilian GP – The Starting Grid
| POS | NO | DRIVER |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 77 | |
| 2 | 33 | |
| 3 | 55 | |
| 4 | 11 | |
| 5 | 4 | |
| 6 | 16 | |
| 7 | 10 | |
| 8 | 31 | |
| 9 | 5 | |
| 10 | 44 | |
| 11 | 3 | |
| 12 | 14 | |
| 13 | 99 | |
| 14 | 18 | |
| 15 | 22 | |
| 16 | 6 | |
| 17 | 63 | |
| 18 | 7 | |
| 19 | 47 | |
| 20 | 9 |
Note – Hamilton penalised 5 grid places for use of additional power unit element.
https://www.formula1.com/en/results.html/2021/races/1104/brazil/starting-grid.html
2021 Brazilian GP Sprint – The Verdict of Hamilton and Verstappen
Lewis Hamilton was stripped of his P1 from Friday’s qualifying after a DRS infringement was found on the rear wing of his F1 W12 EQ Performance racer – which meant title-rival Max Verstappen headed the front of the field for the 100km Qualifying Sprint Race whilst Hamilton started from the back of the pack.
Hamilton took pole by more than four-tenths over Verstappen with Bottas lining up in third, but the former was disqualified from Friday’s qualifying due to the rear wing infringement, which saw the Briton start from the rear of the field. Mercedes announced later that they would not appeal the decision: “We want to win these World Championships on the race track”.
Red Bull’s Max Verstappen was hit with a $5000 fine for touching and examining championship-rival Lewis Hamilton’s rear wing during parc ferme conditions after qualifying in Brazil – but was not given any grid penalty for the offence.
Hamilton’s rear wing was given to the stewards after FIA’s Technical Delegate Jo Bauer found an issue with it on Friday, and was later disqualified from the qualifying results.
But footage was shown of Verstappen after the session looking at the rear wing of the F1 W12 EQ Performance racer in parc ferme, which was a suspected breach of Article 2.5.1 of the FIA International Sporting Code.
The article stated that: “In the Parc Ferme, only the officials assigned may enter. No operation, checking, tuning or repair is allowed unless authorised by the same officials or by the applicable regulations.”
#BrazilianGP FP2: @alo_oficial tops time-sheets ahead of @Max33Verstappen. #F1 #SaoPauloGP
#BrazilianGP Qualifying: @LewisHamilton beats @Max33Verstappen to sprint pole. #F1
#BrazilianGP FP1: @LewisHamilton tops time-sheets ahead of @Max33Verstappen. #F1
Formula 1 Heineken Sao Paulo GP 2021 Preview – #F1 #SaoPauloGP #BrazilianGP
