UK: pre-race 2023

Well, my doesn’t-count-in-the-records tiny free bet on Albon to be top 3 in third practice came off, and qualifying was entertaining too.

At the start it was either inters or softs and most went for softs. It saw a dramatic decline in relative pace for Williams, who struggled to escape. A late red flag when Magnussen’s Haas decided to stop working meant a three minute dash and this put paid to Perez’s hopes as the times ramped up. This was bad luck for the Mexican, who has sometimes been the author of his own qualification misfortune in recent times (for reference, Alonso was two-hundredths from being out). In addition to Perez, we waved farewell to Tsunoda, Zhou Guanyu, de Vries, and, of course, Magnussen.

Q2 was highly competitive and the drying track altered performances, with McLaren looking very nice indeed. Hulkenberg failed to make it out of this stage, as did Stroll (who had a track position squabble with the also-exiting Ocon), Sargeant, and Bottas, whose car failed late on.

Into Q3 Verstappen was the natural favourite but did face challenges from Hamilton and Norris.

In the end, the Dutchman put it on pole again, but he has both McLarens right behind him (Norris ahead by just over a tenth). Then we have both Ferraris (Leclerc ahead by a hundredth) then both Mercedes (Russell ahead by six-hundredths). Albon, Alonso, and Gasly followed.

 

Note: Bottas was disqualified for being unable to provide a fuel sample and starts last. Race likely to be overcast, probably dry.

Early betting thoughts:

Piastri, podium

Albon, points

The McLaren looked formidable in dry conditions, and Norris is joint second shortest for the podium at 2.25 (alongside Leclerc and just a tiny bit shorter than Hamilton, Sainz, and Perez). Piastri is 15. That’s… wrong. If you have two cars of the same type starting 2^nd and 3^rd and the former is 2.25 and the latter is 15 one of them is priced wrong (the Aussie’s odds are the same as Albon’s). Piastri was just a tenth off Norris and while I do think the Briton has a better chance it isn’t nearly 14 times better for a single grid slot. Apparently, both have the same upgrades. This reminds me of Napoli having odds too long for Serie A’s title last season because Inter, AC Milan, and Juventus grab all the limelight. At the time of writing, it was layable at 15 on Betfair and Smarkets. As far as I can tell he doesn’t have a penalty but check this just in case as I’ve made that mistake before.

Albon looked very racy in dry conditions too, and overtaking is possible at Silverstone. He’s 1.44 for a points finish. Bit too short for me, though.

 

Then I invoked the immense prophetic powers of Apollo and browsed the markets:

Piastri, win group 2, 2.5

Sounding like a bit of a Piastri fan this time around but he’s 2.5 to top a group including Albon, Stroll, Gasly, and Ocon. Albon and Gasly made Q3, Stroll and Ocon start 12-13^th. His nearest rival is Albon, five places behind him on the grid.

 

I’ve backed Piastri at 16 for a podium (boosted price) and set up a hedge on Betfair at 5. After some consideration, also went for the Piastri to win group 2 at 2.55 (slightly longer by boosting). There is a nagging doubt that I’ve missed something as the odds disparity between Norris and Piastri is enormous, so do check for yourself, but the F1 site does have Piastri starting in 3^rd.

 

Morris Dancer