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2022 Formula 1 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix highlights

2022 Formula 1 Emilia Romagna GP

GP DELL’EMILIA ROMAGNA F1/2022 - SABATO 23/04/2022 credit: @Scuderia Ferrari Press Office

Introduction

 

Max Verstappen produced a dominant display in Imola to seal his second victory of the season ahead of teammate Sergio Perez, leading a Red Bull one-two at the 2022 Formula 1 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix.

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The Dutchman topped Saturday’s Sprint and led off the line on Sunday, teammate Perez joining him at the front – while Leclerc momentarily dropped to fourth. The Safety Car emerged on the opening lap as Daniel Ricciardo tipped Carlos Sainz into the gravel and out of the race for the second Grand Prix.

With the track drying, drivers began to swap from inters to mediums on Lap 19 – Perez coming in before Verstappen, who led Leclerc into the pits one lap later. The Monegasque emerged just ahead of the Mexican, but Perez skated past for P2 with warmer tyres and then kept the Ferrari at bay.

A late gamble to pit for softs from P3 from Leclerc saw the Red Bulls follow suit and retain the lead, but on Lap 54 – again in chase of Perez – the championship leader spun and hit the wall at Variante Alta. He dropped down to ninth having had to pit for a new nose and softs and recovered only to P6 at the flag.

Lando Norris, therefore, took the final podium place, promoted twice with Sainz retiring and Leclerc going off track. Mercedes’ George Russell enjoyed a brilliant start and was up seven places to P4 as the chequered flag loomed, holding off Alfa Romeo’s Valtteri Bottas by under a second despite a late duel with the driver he replaced at the Silver Arrows.

Yuki Tsunoda finished seventh for AlphaTauri, passing Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel (P8) late on – while Leclerc finished ahead of the pair with his late rescue effort.

Haas’s Kevin Magnussen ran as high as P5 thanks to another blistering start but fell back down the order to ninth. Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll rounded out the top 10, a double-points haul for the team that entered Imola on zero.

Alex Albon’s solid showing put him 11th, ahead of AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly – who couldn’t pry his way past even with DRS (which was activated when the track was deemed dry enough on Lap 34). Lewis Hamilton was next, the Mercedes driver having been unceremoniously lapped by Verstappen on Lap 40, to finish 13th – Esteban Ocon finishing 11th but dropping to 14th thanks to a five-second penalty for an unsafe release.

Zhou Guanyu started from the pit lane after his Sprint crash, the Alfa Romeo driver taking P15 ahead of Williams’ Nicholas Latifi.

In 17th was Mick Schumacher, the Haas driver having spun twice on Sunday afternoon – while Daniel Ricciardo was last and 18th after his Lap 1 tangle with Sainz, pitting again for hards midway through the race in a fruitless strategy.

Along with Sainz, compatriot Fernando Alonso was the other DNF having lost a chunk of his sidepod, Schumacher having lost control and hit the Alpine’s flanks on Lap 1.

Mario Isola – Head of F1 and car racing at Pirelli commented:

At the start of the race, the intermediates worked well over a reasonably long stint, as was expected. I was a little bit surprised though that everyone chose the medium rather than the soft once the track had dried, in the cool and still damp conditions, they were obviously thinking about going all the way to the end, and that’s exactly what many of the drivers did. Ferrari came up with an interesting strategy, which was then copied by Red Bull, to go for the fastest lap with the soft tyre at the end. The medium showed impressive adaptability over long runs because the rain on Friday meant that the teams just had an hour on Saturday morning to understand it, with a maximum run of only around 20 laps possible. Despite that limited information, we saw long runs of 40 laps with no issues. Well done to Red Bull, but also to the fantastic home crowd here at Imola, which always shows such passionate support.

2022 Formula 1 Emilia Romagna GP Race Results

PosNoDriverCountryTeamTimePointsOverall
1.1Max VerstappenNetherlandsRed Bull Racing1:32:07.9862651
2.11Sergio PerezMexicoRed Bull Racing Honda+16.527s1848
3.4Lando NorrisGreat BritainMclaren Racing+34.834s1531
4.63George RussellGreat BritainMercedes-AMG Petronas+42.506s1249
5.77Valtteri BottasFinlandAlfa Romeo F1 Team+43.181s1022
6.16Charles LeclercMonacoScuderia Ferrari+56.072s879
7.22Yuki TsunodaJapanScuderia AlphaTauri+61.110s610
8.5Sebastian VettelGermanyAston Martin F1 Team+70.892s44
9.20Kevin MagnussenDenmarkHaas F1 Team+75.260s214
10.18Lance StrollCanadaAston Martin F1 Team+1 lap11
11.23Alexander AlbonThailandWilliams Racing+1 lap01
12.10Pierre GaslyFranceScuderia AlphaTauri+1 lap06
13.44Lewis HamiltonGreat BritainMercedes-AMG Petronas+1 lap028
14.31Esteban OconFranceAlpine F1 Team+1 lap020
15.24Zhou GuanyuChinaAlfa Romeo F1 Team+1 lap01
16.6Nicholas LatifiCanadaWilliams Racing+1 lap00
17.47Mick SchumacherGermanyHaas F1 Team+1 lap00
18.3Daniel RicciardoAustraliaMcLaren Racing+1 lap08
17.14Fernando AlonsoSpainAlpine F1 TeamDNF02
20.55Carlos SainzSpainScuderia FerrariDNF033

2022 Constructor Standings

PosPictureTeamPoints
1.Red Bull Racing759
1.Scuderia Ferrari554
3.Mercedes-AMG F1 Team515
4.Alpine F1 Team173
5.McLaren Racing159
6.Alfa Romeo Racing55
7.Aston Martin F1 Team55
8.Haas F1 Team37
9.Scuderia AlphaTauri35
10.Williams Racing8

Here are the team-by-team highlights:

Scuderia Ferrari

 

Scuderia Ferrari leaves Imola after the 2022 Formula 1 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix with a sense of what might have been. The team only picked up 20 points at the Enzo e Dino Ferrari circuit: 12 yesterday in the Sprint and eight today courtesy of a sixth-place for Charles Leclerc.

Charles saw his podium chances vanish with just over 10 laps remaining when lying third after he spun at the Variante Gresini. It was a Sunday to forget for Carlos Sainz, who ended up stuck in the gravel at turn 2, following a coming together with Daniel Ricciardo.

On the positive side, the F1-75 once again proved to be competitive and reliable, although this weekend, the team’s closest rivals proved to be particularly quick. Now, all the team will simply roll up their sleeves and get down to work to prepare for the next race in Florida, the USA and the only new venue on this year’s calendar, the Miami International Autodrome.

Charles Leclerc #16

It was a very tricky race. A third was the best result we could have secured today, as our competitors were very strong. I struggled on the Soft tyres but when I saw an opportunity to overtake Perez for the second, I went for it, pushing a bit too much, when I should have stayed put to secure those points. We will analyse all the data and come back stronger.

Carlos Sainz #55

This was an unlucky day. I braked well into turn 1, leaving enough space to my left, but unfortunately, Daniel (Ricciardo) lost control of his car a bit and hit me from behind, throwing me into a spin and into the gravel. It’s a big shame because we were up for a good race, but there is nothing else I could have done differently at that point to avoid it.

It’s tough to take, as today I wanted to have a good race in front of our fans. For the last two races things haven’t gone our way at all, but I’m still confident we can turn it around. There are many races ahead of us and you can be sure we will keep pushing. On to Miami.

Mattia Binotto, Team Principal & Managing Director

IOf course we are disappointed as we wanted a better result than this in front of all our fans. It was a difficult race. Our drivers did not get perfect starts, possibly being on the worse side of the track. Charles’ first pit stop was not the best either, which meant he was back out on track without the gap that might have allowed him to fend off Perez and then he made a mistake trying to overtake him.

Carlos was very unlucky at the start and for the second time in a row, he was unable to finish the race. It’s a real shame, not just because of the points lost, but also because he’s completed very few kilometres in the last few Grands Prix. Nevertheless, we will not lose heart and we will continue to work calmly. We wanted to give the fans something to cheer about, as they packed out the grandstands and the fields with a sea of red to support us here at Imola. Naturally, we are disappointed not to have managed that, but there will be other races and opportunities to put a smile on their faces.

Now we look forward to Miami and a new track, which makes it an even more compelling prospect. We will continue to work hard to extract all the potential out of the F1-75 and optimise the updates that we will be introducing in the coming races.

Scuderia Ferrari best pictures:

Red Bull Racing

 

Oracle Red Bull Racing showed the true pace of their car in the 2022 Formula 1 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix with a dominant display around the storied Imola circuit resulting in an emotional 1–2 finish for the team’s drivers Max Verstappen and Sergio Pérez.

Starting from pole position after winning Saturday’s qualifying Sprint Race, Verstappen was in imperious form and led from lights and was never headed as he mastered the tricky conditions that transitioned from wet to dry to win by 16.527 seconds. He also claimed the fastest lap of the race for the first time this season to claim maximum points for the weekend.

Pérez was equally impressive as he drove to his second consecutive podium finish in a row, making a brilliant start from third on the grid to pass Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc heading into the first turn and slot into second behind Verstappen. From there, the Mexican drove faultlessly to hold the position all the way to the flag.

After a mechanical issue denied him in Australia, victory in Imola was Verstappen’s second win of the season and helped to move him up to second in the Drivers’ Championship standings behind Leclerc. A mistake on the final lap of the race dropped the Ferrari driver from third to sixth place, allowing Verstappen to close to within 27 points of his rival in the standings. Pérez is five points behind Verstappen in third.

Max Verstappen

To have a weekend like this for both of us with a one-two for the team is just incredible. It was a very lovely Sunday! Everything today was well executed, coming into the weekend I didn’t expect it to be like this. It was more or less a perfect weekend, everything went well for us and we’ll enjoy today. I scored the maximum amount of points this weekend and we can be really proud of that as a team, it’s a great boost. Today was all about judging the conditions, making the right calls and staying very focused, and I think we did that very well. We need to keep focused and we know that at the next race we need to be up there again and keep this going.

Sergio Pérez

It was a tough race, but an enjoyable one. Rule number one in these conditions is to finish. It was difficult because in these conditions it’s easy to make a mistake and put a foot wrong, but we managed a clean race and kept out of trouble, which was pretty important. I got a great start and the restart was good too, then I think the team did a great job with strategy out there. On the intermediates, I was really thinking to save the tyres, but the degradation was high and Charles was really fast towards the end of that stint, so I was happy to just keep him behind. The race was pretty intense with Charles, he was always within an undercut range and when we thought we had him under control he boxed and made things a lot harder for both of us. We were both pushing with cold tyres and, in fairness to Charles, it was easy to make mistakes. We have had such a difficult start to the season with reliability concerns and DNFs, so it was really important we brought it home today – it’s a great result for the team.

Christian Horner – Team Principal & CEO

This has to be one of our best ever results, to take the maximum points across the whole weekend, bar one, was incredible. Both Max and Checo have driven brilliantly to secure our first one-two finish since Malaysia in 2016. I’m very proud of the entire team, from everyone at the track and those back in the factory at Milton Keynes, they delivered a phenomenal performance and it’s just what we needed to rebound from Australia. It’s a long season and we’ll take a lot of confidence from this result and try to build on it in Miami in a couple of weeks’ time.

Red  Bull Racing Honda best pictures:

Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 Team

 

George finished the 2022 Formula 1 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix in P4, with Lewis in P13. The race began on a damp track with all drivers opting for the Inter tyre. A good start for George saw him make up places to P5 in the opening laps, with Lewis up to P11.

As the track dried, both drivers boxed for a switch to slicks with George holding position but Lewis dropping back after time lost in the pit lane left him susceptible to the undercut. An issue adjusting George’s front wing meant he ran the entire Medium tyre stint with a car that was set up for the wet, harming his pace and forcing him to defend impressively from BOT in the final few laps to hold on to P4. Lewis found himself stuck in a DRS train behind GAS with the car lacking the straight-line speed to break the train on the straight, and with limited opportunities to overtake elsewhere on the Imola circuit.

Lewis Hamilton

This was a weekend to forget, that’s for sure. Behind Gasly, we both had DRS so it was impossible to overtake, and I lost a few places in the pit stop. This weekend, everything that could go wrong did go wrong. We live and we learn, and there’s not much else to say. I’ll keep working as hard as I can to try and pull it back together, somehow. I hope for a better weekend in Miami, it will be difficult but I’ll try and get myself in a positive headspace for the next one.

George Russell

I’m relatively pleased to maximise the points available this weekend. Whether we’re getting the most out of the car is a different story and I do think things have fallen slightly in our favour with these first four races. I’m really happy with this P4, but if we want to sustain this position in the championship, we need to find more pace. We’ve got these overall limitations with the car with the bouncing, and we know that we are struggling with the tyre warm-up and this is the coldest race weekend we’ve had by far this year.

I think it’s been a bit of a trend since Bahrain, we’ve progressively gotten a bit slower in qualifying, and I think that’s because Bahrain is the hottest we’ve experienced so there was no problem with tyre warm-up. Then we went to Jeddah, and it was still hot, but the track was a bit smoother. Melbourne is a bit cooler. Here, very cold. And that’s when you see the McLarens, Alpines, and Haases coming into their own but then struggling a bit more in the race. We need to find a better compromise because we were fortunate today, we had a decent result, but ultimately, we were starting far too low on the grid.

Toto Wolff

What is clear from the entire weekend is that we have work to do to deliver our drivers a quick enough car. We saw with George what our car can do in clear air but it’s still not good enough. We missed out on adjusting George’s front flap at the pit stop due to an issue which meant he had a car that was set up for wet for the majority of the race so a great drive from him to hold on to the P4 at the end. For Lewis, it was a simple case of us not giving him the tool he needs. He was squeezed by the Alpine, and undercut at the pitstop, which left him in a DRS train where it was impossible to overtake with our car. We are not producing a car good enough or worthy of a World Champion like Lewis so we need to look at things for Miami, make a step forward in our understanding and bring development to the car to fix our issues.

Mercedes-AMG F1 Team best pictures:

McLaren Racing

 

Hear from McLaren Formula 1 drivers Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciardo, and Team Principal Andreas Seidl after the 2022 Formula 1 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix.

Lando Norris

P3, what a result! We certainly didn’t expect that coming into this weekend, so I’m happy to be leaving with a podium. It’s been a tricky weekend, but the team recovered well to put me in a good position for today’s race. I had a good start and was managing my tyres to the end. At that point, we were on for a P4, which would still have been a great result. We got a bit lucky with the issues ahead, but we did what we needed to do to be in a position to take that opportunity. Great work by the team at the track and back at the factory, great pit stops and a great result. On to Miami!

Daniel Ricciardo

It was a great result for Lando! However, it was one of those Sundays for me, unfortunately. At Turn 1, I thought I got hit but it was actually me getting on the kerb. I then slipped off it and went into Carlos [Sainz], before being bumped by Bottas. We had a bit of damage and struggled for the rest of the race. It’s a painful one and it’s never nice to be involved in incidents. There’s not much more to say. Just one of those Sundays. We’ll celebrate Lando’s podium and learn what we can as we head to Miami.

Andreas Seidl

P3 for Lando today comes as the result of hard work and a well-managed strategy. He drove a great race today. After a good start, he worked very hard, looked after his tyres, managed the gap to the cars we were racing and put himself in the best position to take advantage of any opportunity that came his way.

Unfortunately, Daniel had a first-lap collision with Carlos [Sainz] which damaged the car and his race was pretty much over, but he was able to provide useful information to the team to maximise our result.

The performance we saw this weekend on a different track and in a variety of conditions confirms the potential of the MCL36 that we have been unlocking race by race. That said, we remain realistic about the work we have to do to close the gap to the front of the field. Also, our pit crew again delivered good pit stops.

My thanks today to the entire team, here at the track and back home at the factory, together with our colleagues at Mercedes HPP. It’s been an intense first Sprint weekend of the 2022 season. We head home now to reset, analyse what we have learnt here and prepared for our first visit to Miami.

McLaren Racing best pictures:

Alfa Romeo Racing ORLEN

 

Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN delivered a strong performance as the team capped off a successful weekend with a fine fifth place by Valtteri Bottas. Team-mate, Zhou Guanyu, fought well to recover from a pitlane start after yesterday’s retirement, and finished in 15th place.

The ten points added to our tally, in conjunction with the two from yesterday’s Sprint, lift the team to a total of 25 and fifth place in the constructors’ championship.

Valtteri Bottas (car number 77)

It was a fun race for me today! It’s always good to get points, we had a strong race in a car that felt really good. I am happy with how everything went, even though we lost a bit of time in the pit stop, but we bring home ten points today so we’ll take it. I had a bit of a scare at the beginning of the race when I couldn’t avoid Ricciardo when he tangled with Sainz, but luckily we didn’t have any damage. The car had a good pace, especially once we went on the mediums, and only at the very end, when I caught George [Russell] I had some graining on my rear right that cost me performance. The team is working really well, there’s a good atmosphere and it’s nice to see the upgrades we brought to the track worked. There’s still a lot of work to do and many races ahead of us, so we can still improve and have some fun weekends.

Zhou Guanyu (car number 24)

Not the result I wanted today, but there are still a lot of positives from me to take out of this weekend: not just the performance I showed over the three days, but also how I got up to speed quickly in my first Sprint race. The weekend started better than expected and I had a good qualifying, but yesterday really compromised our final result. It was always going to be hard to make it into the top ten from the pit lane, especially as today it was quite difficult to pass, and once I got past the Williams, the gap to the cars ahead was too big. The rest of my race was quite uneventful, but I can still look at the things I learned in difficult conditions and make sure I get back stronger in the next races.

Frédéric Vasseur, Team Principal

It has been a strong weekend for the team and to bring home 12 points between yesterday and today is a deserved reward. We delivered upgrades that worked well, a brilliant job by the team at home, and the crew were incredible both on Friday and Saturday night, with two rebuild jobs they undertook with a strong spirit. Our race today was positive: Valtteri had a really good pace and was able to fight for P4 until the final lap; Zhou always had a difficult job on his hands after yesterday’s crash, but did well to recover from a pitlane start to finish 15th with some good overtakes on the way. There are so many positives we can take away from this weekend, not just in terms of the result but also in the way we went about our business, and we can definitely aspire to do even better in the next few races.

Alfa Romeo F1 Team best pictures:

Alpine F1 Team

 

BWT Alpine F1 Team ended its 2022 points scoring streak in Imola after a frustrating 2022 Formula 1 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix saw Esteban Ocon finish fourteenth, while Fernando Alonso retired his car after damage from a lap one collision.

In the first wet race of the season, both Alpine drivers managed to gain positions during incidents in the opening laps. In these exchanges, Fernando was hit on the right side of his car on the exit of Turn 3, and the resulting impact left damage to the sidepod and floor.

Unfortunately, the damage was too severe, and Fernando was forced to retire a few laps later.

Esteban spent his race battling for the last points-scoring position and found himself running in eleventh for most of the race. His chances of finishing inside the top ten were then hampered, when he received a five-second time penalty for an unsafe release at his one and an only pit stop for Medium tyres. Esteban crossed the line in eleventh, but after the time penalty was applied, he ended up in the fourteenth position.

Fernando Alonso

It was another unfortunate race for us this season. We made a decent start and moved up to eighth but there was a lot of damage on the right side of my floor and on the sidepod, so we had no choice but to retire. It’s unlucky as a small brush with Mick [Schumacher], which wasn’t intentional, destroyed our car and race. After Australia, I feel that I could have scored 20 or 30 points in the championship, and I have only two. It’s unlucky! It’s a long season and there are plenty of points still to score.

Esteban Ocon

It was a frustrating race for us in the end where we’ve not scored any points. For me, it’s been a tricky one since the beginning and the Qualifying result compromised the rest of my weekend so if you think about it, where we ended up today before the penalty is not too bad. We lacked a bit of race pace and in the end, we were not quick enough to get into the points even without the five-second penalty. It’s a really tight pit lane but we’ll be looking at exactly what happened in the debrief tonight to see if it could’ve been avoided. We’ll learn and move on from this one, and I’m already looking forward to Miami.

Laurent Rossi, CEO Alpine

Plain and simple, this weekend was a disappointing one for the team and it’s the first race of the season where we leave without scoring points. We must make sure this does not happen again this year as we have much stronger potential than that. As a team, there are many areas we must improve, and we must also eradicate errors quickly if we are to achieve our ambitious goals. While we feel frustrated by today’s result, we will count on it as additional motivation to not have this feeling again during the year. I’m confident in the team to keep working hard and we absolutely must bounce back next time in Miami.

Alpine F1 Team best pictures:

Scuderia AlphaTauri

 

Showing a good race pace all weekend, Scuderia AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda drove an impressive race to pass his way up from 12th on the grid to finish in seventh place, his best result of the season so far. The Japanese driver also set the fifth fastest lap of the race. French team-mate Pierre Gasly finished the race in 12th place after starting from 17th on the grid.

Pierre Gasly

It was a frustrating race, we were all stuck in a DRS train and with the top speed we had, we weren’t able to do much. We’ve had really great performances in quali up until this weekend, where sadly we didn’t perform well, which meant we were on the back foot from Friday. We need to go away and work out how to get back to a stronger qualifying performance for the next race. I’m really excited about Miami, the track looks really good and I’m looking forward to racing there.

Yuki Tsunoda

I’m super happy with today, especially to score points at our home track. There are a lot of people from the factory watching here in the grandstands today, every lap I could see the AlphaTauri flags being waved and it gave me a great boost, so it feels like a big thank you to everyone that works so hard in the team. The pace of the car has been really good today, I didn’t expect it to be quite that strong heading into the race, but we’ve made progress through the week and I’m pleased with the performance we showed this afternoon.

Franz Tost – Team Principal

It was a very exciting race today. I would like to congratulate Oracle Red Bull Racing for their well-deserved one-two. Max and Checo controlled the pace for the entire race, they did a really fantastic job. As for us, we also had a successful race. Yuki started in 12th position and after the first lap was already up to 10th. He drove a really strong race, overtaking many cars, to finish in seventh place. Yuki has been competitive immediately, from Friday onwards, so I think he now has a good basis for the upcoming races. Pierre on the other hand struggled a little bit this weekend and, in the race, he was unable to pass the cars ahead of him, to finish the race in 12th. We now have to analyse everything and find out what we can do to improve our performance for Miami. I think the new upgrades we introduced here this weekend worked well and we now need to fine-tune the car to have both drivers steadily in the points.

Being our home race, many employees of Scuderia AlphaTauri were able to enjoy the race from the grandstands today, so it was great for them to be able to enjoy Yuki’s exciting performance here in Imola. I want to say a big thank you to everyone in the team, both in Faenza and Bicester, who has contributed to today’s success.

Scuderia AlphaTauri Team best pictures:

Haas F1 Team

 

Haas F1 Team finished with Kevin Magnussen ninth and Mick Schumacher 17th at the 2022 Formula 1 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, held Sunday at Autodromo Internazionale Enzo e Dino Ferrari.

Heavy rain during the build-up to the race start meant both Magnussen and Schumacher required Pirelli Cinturato Green intermediates for lights out. Magnussen surged up to the fifth place from eighth on the grid but unfortunately from his maiden top 10 grid spot, Schumacher made contact with Fernando Alonso through the first chicane and was sent into a spin. That left Schumacher down in 17th.

The circuit dried sufficiently for slick tires on lap 19 and both Magnussen and Schumacher came into the pits to take on Pirelli P Zero Yellow mediums. Magnussen re-emerged on track in eighth while Schumacher maintained 17th position. The Dane got into a good rhythm but had to cede one position to AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda, shuffling down to ninth, but it ensured Magnussen added two more points to his and Haas F1 Team’s tally – a third Grand Prix finish scoring points from the four contested this season. Schumacher brought his Haas VF-22 home in 17th position after a second pit-stop to switch onto Red softs to run through to the checkered.

Reigning World Champion Max Verstappen controlled proceedings to register his 22nd career victory, leading home Red Bull Racing teammate Sergio Perez. McLaren’s Lando Norris completed the podium celebrations in third.

Haas F1 Team currently holds eighth place in the Constructors’ Championship with 15 points.

Haas F1 Team will return to action at the inaugural Miami Grand Prix, to be held at the Miami International Autodrome, from May 6 to 8.

Kevin Magnussen, Driver No. 20

We scored points again – both yesterday and today – so that’s a good weekend. When we qualified P4, hopes were very high at the beginning, but we’ve got to be realistic as well and getting away with points in both the sprint and the main race, that’s a decent weekend. At the beginning of the race, I was on intermediates and got up to P5 and the pace was pretty good. Then the track dried up and we were a bit late to come in for slicks, so we got undercut by a couple of people. We came out and fought for points – got two today, three points over the weekend – so it was pretty decent.

Mick Schumacher, Driver No. 47

Unfortunately, I lost our position right at the beginning and then had to recover from there. It was quite difficult, the Williams was very quick in the straights, so no chance for me there to get by. We were hoping we had more pace. It was quite unfortunate, but we live and we learn, we try to look ahead and do it better next time.

Guenther Steiner, Team Principal, Haas F1 Team

We would have wished to have got a little bit more today but after four races, and three with points, we took something home and I think there is more to come. It wasn’t an ideal race for us with Mick spinning on the first lap, which put him to the back, and with the field, like it is now recovering is almost impossible. Kevin was fighting hard, was going well on the wets and then on the dry tires, we were just not fast enough for the others. We scored three points over the weekend, so we need to keep on working and get ourselves in the position to be at the other end of the midfield, not at the back.

Haas F1 Team best pictures:

Aston Martin Formula One Team

 

Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant Formula One Team scored its first points finish of the 2022 season when Sebastian Vettel and Lance Stroll finished eighth and 10th respectively in Imola.

The 2022 Formula 1 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix hosted a race affected by changeable conditions, which benefitted the team and, alongside a well-executed strategy, brought a double-points result.

Lance Stroll

It has been a positive weekend for the team and it is great to see both cars in the points. It was a well-earned point for us today because there was intense pressure throughout the race, not to mention the changeable weather conditions. At the beginning of the race, we performed strongly. Everyone was battling overheating tyres and a drying track, but we kept [Lewis] Hamilton behind and pressured [Yuki] Tsunoda ahead. Once we switched to the Medium tyre, we continued to show good pace and pulled away from the train of cars behind us. I am happy that we performed better this weekend and made the most of the opportunities that came our way. Qualifying and the race were in cooler and wet conditions, which may have suited us. We will enjoy today but will continue to keep pushing for more in the coming races.

Sebastian Vettel

The team did really well today and we maximised everything to finish P8. It is an important result for the team because they have worked so hard in a challenging season so far. It is clear that we benefitted from the cooler and damp conditions on Friday and Sunday, but we still needed to capitalise on the opportunities that came our way. We also achieved that through good strategy, making our pitstop for dry tyres at the right moment. We may not have had the pure pace in this race, but we managed the tyres well and we got both cars into the points. It is nice to get off the mark and get points in the bag and now we are looking forward to Miami.

Mike Krack

Both Sebastian and Lance drove faultlessly in today’s tricky wet-to-dry race. In wet conditions, Sebastian vaulted into ninth on lap one, then comfortably raced inside the top 10 for the whole race. As the track dried, he was one of the very first drivers to roll the dice and switch from Intermediates to the Medium tyre. The team and he judged that stop perfectly and Sebastian then ran smoothly in P7 until the closing laps, when he dropped to eighth.

Equally, Lance didn’t put a foot wrong this afternoon. He too made a strong start, made up positions on the opening lap, and enjoyed a fantastic, spirited tussle with [Yuki] Tsunoda. After his stop, he settled down in 10th place, withstood race-long pressure from a train of cars behind him and scored his first point of the season. This was an eventful and exciting Grand Prix – and only ourselves and Red Bull Racing managed to bring both cars home in the points today. We know we still have a long way to go, but this afternoon’s result is a great boost for the whole team – both here in Imola and back at the factory.

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Williams Racing

 

The team rounded out what had been a tough Emilia Romagna Grand Prix weekend by finishing just outside of the top 10.

Alex Albon secured a P11 finish after keeping Pierre Gasly and Lewis Hamilton at bay for well over half of the total race distance, whilst Nicholas Latifi crossed the line in P16. After rain earlier in the afternoon, the iconic Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari had dried sufficiently to ensure an intermediate tyre start for every driver on the grid.

Alex Albon

I’m really happy with the result today. We maximised the opportunities and overtook some cars on track with the pace we had.
“We had a new rear wing configuration for the weekend which really helped us hold position, and was particularly important in the second half of the race when battling with Gasly.

It’s a shame that we missed out on points by one place, but we are taking opportunities, doing things differently and showing that we can battle higher up despite not having the fastest car.

I was hoping DRS would be enabled a little earlier; we had six or seven laps where we were faster than the cars ahead and, with our downforce levels, we could have got past straight away if we’d had DRS.

By the time it was enabled I was wishing it hadn’t been! Overall, another weekend with plenty of positives for the team to take onwards to Miami.

Nicholas Latifi

It was definitely a very tricky race and I think everyone expected that when we saw the rain coming down ahead of going to the grid.

It was very similar conditions to the start of the race here last year so I’m pleased we managed to get to the end of the Grand Prix this year! It was important for me to get that experience and continue to build my confidence in the car, as I still feel that it’s not quite where it needs to be yet.

I think we made some steps doing that though which is positive, and our pace at the end on the medium tyre was relatively strong.

Dave Robson, Head of Vehicle Performance:

Today’s mixed conditions made for some difficult decisions. But we took our opportunities well and can be pleased with the result.

Alex drove really well, spending his entire stint on the Medium tyres both in the dirty air from Ocon and with Gasly constantly applying pressure behind. It’s a shame we couldn’t get a few more places when we first switched to the Medium tyre as the car was working really well at that point.

However, it was a good recovery from a difficult weekend. Nicholas showed some excellent pace on the Medium compound and drove a strong and well-controlled race.

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