It was inevitable that the definition of the 2022 Formula 1 championship would leave little taste in the mouths of those who ten months ago had a bellyful of emotion and adrenaline unprecedented in the history of the highest category of motorsports thanks to hand in hand, sustained until the last lap of the last race of the year, between Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes and Max Verstappen’s Red Bull. If then they arrived, with their opposite driving styles and a broken human relationship, in the United Arab Emirates tied on points after a muddy season, changing to the point of bipolarity, stressful and fought on and off the tracks, this year the matter definitely seemed inclined towards the Dutchman, who with the victory achieved this morning at the Japanese Grand Prix added his second consecutive crown.
This present of absolute dominance, however, is very different from a start that had Verstappen suffering, like his teammate Sergio “Checo” Pérez, from reliability problems in the brand new Red Bull Powertrains engines, built by Honda but put to the test. point for the energy drinks team in the face of F1’s departure from the Japanese company. “I have no reason to think about the championship right now. I’m too far behind, I think I would need 45 races to have another chance, ”he had said on April 12, shortly after getting out of his smoking car for the second time in three grands prix. Impossible to know if it was a genuine statement or a way to release the pressure of the initial missteps in the defense of the title. The truth is that, although after that visit to Australia there were 20 dates left, the Monegasque Charles Leclerc, aboard a Ferrari, had a 46-point advantage thanks to two wins and a second place.
There was the smell of Ferrari’s glorious return after two years without its drivers climbing to the top of the podium and fifteen without titles. Even more so when the red cars seemed to be the ones that had best tuned in to a new regulation that implied, among other things, the most radical change in aerodynamic terms in several decades. But as the tournament progressed, the Italian team – whose decisions are discussed in the boot-shaped country with the same passion as the line-ups and tactics of soccer teams here – became entangled in a web of bad strategies, mechanical failures and driving errors, if not all three, which made Leclerc translate his nine pole positions into just three wins. It is enough to remember what happened in Spain, Azerbaijan and France, where the Monegasque was comfortably first, until he left: in the first two, due to the blowing up of the engine; in the other, due to an oversight.
Verstappen embodied the idea that the enemy should not be interrupted when he is making mistakes, and took advantage of every false step by Ferrari to first narrow the lead and then extend it to more than 100 points, the equivalent of four wins. Red Bull, in addition to a remarkable ability to adapt its strategies to the unforeseen events of each race, was fine-tuning its power plants and adjusting a vehicle that, after the European summer break, was simply unbeatable. In Belgium, for example, Verstappen started 14th and, in just seven laps, was already fourth, to end up winning with an 18-second advantage over Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari.
Gasly was no less shocking – who next year will occupy the position vacated by Alonso in Alpine – when he encountered a crane entering the track, recovering the ghost of the tragic death of another Frenchman, Jules Bianchi, as a result of the accident he suffered on this circuit in the Grand Prix eight years ago, when he collided with another extractor tractor. Initially a safety car was decreed, but it quickly became a red flag and the test was interrupted, after a tortuous start in which Albon also left and the Chinese Guanyu Zhou (Alfa Romeo) and Vettel (Aston Martin) also had other good scares. ), who had clashed with Alonso at the start, and who finished sixth this Sunday, one place ahead of the brilliant Asturian driver. That he got oil again and put an end to two races full of bad luck in which he abandoned due to reliability problems with his Alpine.
It continued to rain on the Mie prefecture circuit and the long interruption gave rise to numerous messages of rejection, on social networks, due to the sad episode of the crane, among which those of the Englishman Lando Norris (McLaren), tenth east Sunday (“We lost a life years ago. This is unacceptable”), and ‘Checo’ (“We lost Jules because of that mistake. I hope this is the last time I see a tow truck on the track”). But, above all, the appeal of the father of the deceased, Philippe Bianchi, who was forceful in his letter, drew attention. “No respect for the pilot’s life, no respect for Jules’ memory. Unbelievable,” he wrote.
And Hamilton? The Englishman had been winning at least one race per year since his debut, in 2007, but this season he paid dearly for Mercedes’ commitment to an aerodynamic design that made the silver cars suffer like no other on the grid from the vicissitudes generated by an old acquaintance. of F1: the “porpoising effect”, as the rebound of single-seaters is known due to the way in which air circulates through the internal channels of the floor when they reach high speeds. A phenomenon that not only implies a loss of performance and an extra mechanical effort, but also an enormous physical wear and tear for the drivers, the same one that Hamilton felt in the fastest circuits. Mercedes engineers tested dozens of variants in the first stage of the year, until the cocktail of public complaints from the seven-time champion and the FIA’s refusal to modify the regulations forced them to a clean slate that, effectively, meant a new design that considerably reduced the bounce. But it was too late to fight for the championship: the horizon has been set for 2023 for several races.
With four races to complete the calendar and twelve wins for Verstappen, three unknowns remain to be resolved. The first is whether the Dutchman will break the record of 13 wins in one year shared by Germans Michael Schumacher and Sebastian Vettel. The second, if the Mexican Pérez will be able to steal the runner-up from Leclerc, a fight that, due to its closeness, promises to be defined in Abu Dhabi. The third will not be stirred on the track, and has to do with the confirmation that the FIA is investigating whether Red Bull exceeded the budget limit of 145 million euros in 2021. If the fault is verified, the team is exposed to a significant sanction . News was expected for this weekend, but the regulatory body warned that, if any, they will arrive after Japan. Don’t be a question of spitting the roast on Red Bull just when Super Max is testing its second crown…and at Honda’s house.