How did the alleged improvements go on the Aston Martin? Is there any sign of improved performance? – Chris
Honda gave a debut to its long-awaited ‘spec two’ engine at the Dutch Grand Prix, while Aston Martin added a new front wing and diffuser to the pretty much all-new car that was introduced at the previous race in Hungary.
Within the team, they were hoping that the Honda engine would reduce lap times by somewhere in the region of 0.3-0.5secs.
The weekend painted a confusing picture.
On the one hand, Fernando Alonso looked more competitive than ever before at various points.
But he qualified further away from pole in both positional and percentage terms than he had in Hungary.
There were, however, extenuating circumstances, in that he was 12th fastest before failing to improve on a messy final lap hindered by a sub-optimal ‘prep’ lap which left his tyres out of the ‘window’. Without that, he probably would have progressed beyond the first session.
Nevertheless, that suggests the new Honda was little better than the old one. On the other hand, the new engine’s drivability was definitely worse, which may have skewed the picture.
But then Alonso drove an outstanding race on a one-stop strategy to take ninth place, looking after tyres and measuring his pace with all the expertise and skill he has shown throughout his career to hold off two faster cars in Pierre Gasly’s Alpine and Yuki Tsunoda’s Racing Bull in the final stint.
Those are the first points Aston Martin have scored on merit all season.
As Alonso put it: “We scored one point in Monaco with nine DNFs (retirements). Today we scored two points with Max (Verstappen) DNF. It was well deserved.”
Alonso said after the race that the team were planning a two-stop but changed during the race because they were stuck behind other cars.
“We are in traffic,” he said. “We cannot use our potential. We are faster in the corners than the people in front of us and we are slower on the straights. We’re stuck behind.
“So as soon as we have free track in front of us, we try to use it. Even if it’s not the optimal performance and the optimal strategy, and it’s what we did today.”
On the car and engine upgrades, Alonso said: “Another step forward, especially on the chassis side.
“We brought four or five components here. Also the Budapest package was understood in the (summer) break. With all the data available after the race, we fine-tuned a little bit the set-up around that new spec. Plus the new parts. I think now we are optimising the chassis side and we are able to extract the maximum.
“The engine is more difficult. I don’t think we can be black and white if we have more power or not.
“On the driver side of things, you change circuits one month after the other race. The drivability has been a difficult weekend. We struggled with the downshift again. We struggled with the engine braking corner to corner. It was a challenging weekend in that regard.”
These engines are highly complex and it takes time for teams to dial into them so they are working at their optimum. So it may be a few more races before the new Honda can be judged fairly.
Did Charles Leclerc cost Ferrari and Lewis Hamilton a podium position by holding Hamilton up when he refused to pit when instructed to, and what will Ferrari do to ensure he follows team orders in the future? – Mike
Mid-race in Zandvoort, Lewis Hamilton came up behind Charles Leclerc on fresher tyres, their strategies offset, and asked to be let by to optimise his race.
The way the television broadcast was played out, it sounded as if Ferrari decided to pit Leclerc for fresh tyres to get him out of the way. He initially resisted that and did not come in, but then came in at the next call.
Team boss Frederic Vasseur addressed this after the race, in comments that were a little unclear.
First, he said, at that point, Ferrari were thinking of running Hamilton to the end, so they did not want him to push hard – but had not told him that was the case, because they wanted to keep the plan secret from their rivals.
As for Leclerc, Vasseur said they were “expecting him to pit” but then realised he was in danger of coming out in traffic.
Vasseur said: “Charles was supposed to pit, we extended one lap, and it was a kind of confusion, but I’m not worried about this. Everybody will be back in the briefing, they will have a clear picture about the race.”
Some will inevitably say this was another example of Ferrari messing up their strategy, an accusation that is levelled at them quite often.
Vasseur said: “It’s not so easy, but, if I look at the race now, my issue is that we didn’t tell Lewis that we were expecting him to go to the end, and it was not a matter of (him) pushing (at that point).”
Did the delay cost Hamilton third? Hamilton thought so, but it’s impossible to know whether he would have passed George Russell if he had had a lap or two more to try.