Light clouds. Dry. Air +21C, Rail +37…36C
In the 2022 season, the Austrian stage was held for the first time in the sprint format on Saturday. For the second weekend in a row, the stands were completely packed, but when they rooted for Hamilton and other Britons at Silverstone, they were painted orange at Spielberg – according to the organizers, up to 55,000 tickets were sold through the Max Verstappen fan club.
Max set the fastest time in Friday practice before taking pole with 0.026 seconds.
Qualification turned out to be interesting. Both Mercedes drivers crashed with the cars, Hamilton even had to change the chassis. An unusual situation arose with Sergio Perez. In the second session, he went off the track in the eighth corner, but the circle was not canceled immediately – and Sergio went to the final of qualifying. In the evening, the stewards canceled not only the lap in the second session, where the Mexican was off track, but also all his laps in the qualifying final, leaving Sergio only 13th in the sprint.
Verstappen and Leclerc started the sprint from the front row of the grid on Saturday, Sainz and Russell from the second, Okon and Magnussen from the third.
Pirelli brought the softest compositions to the stage – C3, C4 and C5 in the role of Hard, Medium and Soft. For a short 24 lap sprint race, Albon, Stroll, Latifi and Vettel opted for Soft, the rest started on Medium.
Before the start, Alonso’s car was completely shut down, so the mechanics did not remove him from the lifts and the thermal covers. The car rolled back into the pits, the Spaniard did not start.
At the end of the forming circle, Zhou’s car stopped – the engine stalled. The Race Directorate announced an extra formation lap, Guanyu was able to start the engine and started from the pit lane.
Leclerc attacked Verstappen at the start, but Max kept the lead. Hamilton was wedged between Elbon and Gasley – and rolled back to 11th place.
Pierre was flipped over after contacting the wheel of Lewis’s car, he lost several positions but kept moving. Sainz was ahead of Leclerc, but before the end of the circle, Charles returned to position.
Top ten in round 2: Verstappen – Leclerc – Sainz – Russell – Ocon – Magnussen – Schumacher – Perez – Bottas – Elbon.
Albon knocked out Norris in the battle for position – and was later given a five-second penalty.
On lap 4 Hamilton passed Elbon for tenth place.
Verstappen quickly drove away from Leclerc and created a 2.5 second lead on lap five.
Sainz attacked Leclerc several times – the cars almost touched and Carlos fell behind after a request from the pits. Norris and Ricciardo overtook Albon.
On lap 8 Hamilton passed Bottas for ninth. Gasly surpassed Latifi.
On lap 9, Pérez took advantage of the Haas F1 drivers’ battle – beating Schumacher to move up to 7th place.
On lap 11 Vettel crashed into the gravel at turn six after contacting Elbon, but returned to the track and continued on his way.
On lap 12, Pérez overtook Ocon for fifth.
Top ten in round 15: Verstappen – Leclerc – Sainz – Russell – Perez – Ocon – Magnussen – Schumacher – Hamilton – Bottas.
On lap 16, Gasly and Zhou overtook Tsunoda.
On lap 22 Hamilton passed Schumacher for eighth after a long battle. Mick asked the team to slow Magnussen in front of him – and he ended up in the DRS zone behind his partner again, but this didn’t happen.
On the last lap, the engineer asked Vettel to put the car in the pits.
Max Verstappen won the sprint at Spielberg on Saturday and confirmed his right to start from pole in Sunday’s race. Top four positions have not changed.
Perez played the most and rose from 13th to fifth place. Alonso lost the most – the Spaniard would start eighth and start tomorrow’s race last.
After the end of the sprint, Esteban Ocon’s car stalled on track due to fuel pump problems – a similar failure caused him to retire at Silverstone.
Sprint results
| pilot | Team | Time | Speed | Glasses |
| 1. Mr Verstappen | Red Bull | 26:30.059 | 224.568 | eight |
| 2. Sh. Leclerc | Ferrari | +1.675 | 224,331 | 7 |
| 3. K. Sainz | Ferrari | +5.644 | 223,773 | 6 |
| 4. D. Russell | Mercedes | +13.429 | 222,687 | 5 |
| 5. C.Perez | Red Bull | +18.302 | 222,012 | four |
| 6. E. Okon | alpine | +31,032 | 220.269 | 3 |
| 7. K. Magnussen | hare | +34.539 | 219,793 | 2 |
| 8. L. Hamilton | Mercedes | +35.447 | 219,671 | a |
| 9. M. Schumacher | hare | +37.163 | 219,439 | † |
| 10. V. Bottas | Alfa Romeo | +37.557 | 219,386 | † |
| 11. L. Norris | McLaren | +38,580 | 219.248 | † |
| 12. D. Riccardo | McLaren | +39.738 | 219,092 | † |
| 13. L. Walk | Aston Martin | +48.241 | 217,955 | † |
| 14. G. Zhou’ | Alfa Romeo | +50.753 | 217,622 | † |
| 15. P. Gasly | AlphaTauri | +52.125 | 217.440 | † |
| 16. A. Albon * | Williams | +52.412 | 217,402 | † |
| 17. Y. Tsunoda | AlphaTauri | +54.556 | 217.118 | † |
| 18. N. Latifi | Williams | +68,694 | 215.268 | † |
| 19. S. Vettel | Aston Martin | has not completed | 211.885 | † |
* added five seconds to Elbon’s score for knocking an opponent off the track
best lapTime: Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) – 1:08.321 (4 lap, 227.525 km/h)
Reasons for leaving
| pilot | Team | circles | Cause |
| F. Alonso | alpine | 0 | didn’t start |
Championship position : Individual
Championship position : Constructors’ Championship
| Team | engine | Glasses | |
| † | 1 Red Bull Racing | Red Bull powertrains | 340 |
| † | 2 Scuderia Ferrari | Ferrari | 278 |
| † | 3. Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 Team | Mercedes | 210 |
| † | 4 McLaren Racing | Mercedes | 73 |
| † | 5 Alpine F1 Team | Renault | 70 |
| † | 6. Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN | Ferrari | 51 |
| † | 7 Scuderia AlphaTauri | Red Bull powertrains | 27 |
| † | 8 Haas F1 Team | Ferrari | 22 |
| † | 9. Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant F1 Team | Mercedes | eighteen |
| † | 10 Williams Racing | Mercedes | 3 |
Source: F1 News
I’m Todderic Kirkman, a journalist and author for athletistic. I specialize in covering all news related to sports, ranging from basketball to football and everything in between. With over 10 years of experience in the industry, I have become an invaluable asset to my team. My ambition is to bring the most up-to-date information on sports topics around the world.
