Spain: pre-race 2023
Qualifying was very much the Max Verstappen show, but some surprise eliminations and a surprising (mostly) top 10 did make things shape up quite nicely for tomorrow. Apart from a Dutch victory procession, of course.
Q1 was punctuated by a red flag after Albon decorated the track with gravel. It was also notable for Leclerc’s bizarre and consistent lack of pace which saw him take an early exit. Less surprising was losing Magnussen, both Williams, and Bottas.
In Q2 things were tight. So tight that Perez got eliminated by half a tenth. So did Russell, both men some way off their team mates. Zhou Guanyu, De Vries, and Tsunoda also failed to proceed. We also saw a clash between the Mercedes cars as Russell moved over, eliminating a gap Hamilton was going for. This weird mini-collision (which did nothing serious but did damage Hamilton’s front wing) was because Russell had abandoned a hot lap and was going for another, Hamilton didn’t realise and Russell didn’t know his team mate was there.
Going into Q3 it seemed that Hamilton might be favourite for 2nd place, with the top slot firmly reserved by the reigning champion. Verstappen duly made the pole his own, though the grid after him was somewhat unexpected. Sainz ended up sharing the front row, with Norris and Gasly forming row two. However, Gasly has not one but two investigations for impeding, so this could well change.
The third row is Hamilton and Stroll, who outqualified Alonso. Ocon and Hulkenberg followed, with Alonso and Piastri completing the top 10.
The race will probably be dry. But then, that was the forecast for Monaco too. In expected news, Gasly got a six-place penalty for impeding other drivers.
Early betting thoughts:
Alonso, top 6, podum
Sainz win, each way
Perez, top 6
Alonso starts 8th, and is 2.75 for a podium, 1.25 to be top 6. The latter isn’t worth it as, while his pace is near certain to be good enough, the risk of a DNF through mishap or such is too high to make such short odds tempting. 2.75 for a podium for Alonso, however, is well worth considering.
Sainz is 9 each way to win, third the odds top 2. If he can maintain his position he has a decent chance of this working out. An interesting race consideration is that the circuit’s meant to be hard on tyres, though. This may not help Ferrari but should be good for Aston Martin. And Red Bull
Perez is 1.33 to be top 6. Highly likely to occur, odds a bit rubbish.
I also perused the markets and saw the following:
Norris, win each way, 34
Over 16.5 classified and over 2.5 leaders, 3.75
Norris starts 3rd but may slipstream to top 2 off the line. If he does, 34 to win each way (and that’s the unboosted price) could then perhaps be hedged and have a decent chance of coming off.
Reliability has been pretty good this year, and it’s apparently expected we’ll have multiple pit stops this time which should increase the number of race leaders. The problem is that Verstappen may have such a pace advantage he just retains the lead. So, tricky to tell.
It’s not terribly original but I’ve backed Alonso to be on the podium at 2.8. His qualifying was not great but if the new track layout does increase overtaking opportunities he is well-placed to advance up the field as Stroll was six-tenths ahead of him. And Alonso’s very good at the old wheel-to-wheel stuff.
Race start is 2pm UK time.
Morris Dancer
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