An in-depth analysis of the F1® Austrian GP 2022

Charles Leclerc chalked up an important win at Red Bull’s home Grand Prix in Spielberg, Austria beating home Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton in a nerve-wracking finish. His third victory of the season restored some much-needed confidence after Ferrari’s mechanical and strategic failures of the last few races, but it was not without drama.

Both Ferraris showed great pace in the early stages and looked to have the measure of Red Bull, despite them having been outperformed by Red Bull in Saturday’s Sprint Race. Leclerc was able to capitalise on the Ferrari F175’s superior tyre management to delay his pitstops and cover any strategic moves by Red Bull. Despite losing track position after pit stops, the Ferraris improved race pace and fresher rubber allowed him to blast past Verstappen on three separate occasions.

The smoothed polynomial fit of lap times below clearly demonstrates Leclerc’s dominance until the latter stages of the race.

With Carlos Sainz rapidly closing in on Verstappen, Ferrari looked poised for a comfortable 1-2 finish, but disaster struck as Sainz’s engine blew up spectacularly, engulfing the car in flames and prompting a virtual safety car on lap 56. This led to a flurry of pitstops and negated Ferrari’s accumulated on-track advantage. Leclerc continued to lead with composure despite the mental uncertainty of yet another mechanical failure preying on his mind and Verstappen looming on new tyres. Ferrari’s misfortune was then compounded when Leclerc complained over the team radio of his throttle sticking, making him unable to reduce throttle lower than 20/30%, despite completely lifting off the pedal. With a 4-second lead over Verstappen with 11 laps to go and mechanical issues, memories of Baku must have been resurfacing.

The plot below shows early signs of Leclerc's throttle issue manifesting on lap 51 and gradually deteriorating. Comparing successive laps illustrates the initial gradual increase of the minimum throttle, showing Leclerc was unable to completely reduce throttle, in comparison with Verstappen’s clean, zeroed throttle telemetry. The plot also shows the erratic nature of the problem, especially turns 4 and 6, where the throttle is blipping, making the Ferrari more unpredictable and harder to manage.

Fortunately for Leclerc, the Spielberg Red Bull Ring is a short, fast-paced circuit with only ten corners, seven of which require the driver to reduce the throttle. Nonetheless, the sticking throttle was especially problematic in the slow corners – especially turn 3, the slow hairpin corner.

“Not only a little bit stressful, very stressful,” Leclerc commented post-race. “The throttle was really inconsistent and in the middle of the corner, it would get stuck to whatever percentage. So in Turn 3, it was very, very tricky because that’s where you don’t want any more speed in mid-corner.”

Throttle control is absolutely crucial to optimising corner speed. On every corner, a Formula 1® driver employs a number of advanced braking and throttling techniques to adjust the pitch and balance of the car to maximise speed throughout the corner. Trail-braking is an advanced technique to alter the angle of the car on corner entry and shift the grip between front and rear axles by gently lingering on the brake. The driver then smoothly transitions from the brake to throttle, maintaining as much speed through the corner apex as possible and balancing the car mid-corner by gently feathering the throttle. Once the corner exit is visible, the driver can gradually increase the throttle and simultaneously straighten up the steering. All top-class drivers corner unconsciously through “feeling” the car through each corner which is why car set-up is crucial and tailored to each driver. Most Formula 1® drivers prefer a twitchy, oversteering car that is agile and responsive but requires quick reflexes to manage.

Counter-intuitively, maintaining the highest average speed round throughout corners may not necessarily yield the quickest lap time. By “tightening” the corner by taking a later apex, the driver can reduce the amount of time spent in the corner and apply throttle sooner to achieve a high-speed exit – basically sacrificing a slower entry speed for a higher exit speed. This strategy is only really applicable for powerful cars with high grip, a slower car would not benefit. Furthermore, it puts greater demand on the tyres and is highly inadvisable in the wet.

Amazingly, Leclerc managed to successfully tame his misbehaving Ferrari and keep a charging Verstappen at arms-length. Both drivers posted their fastest laps on lap 62 too, as illustrated in the telemetry plot. Verstappen was only just over three-tenths of a second quicker, with the advantage of DRS and Leclerc struggling with his throttle.

Although Sainz’s retirement took the gloss off a dominant Ferrari performance and potentially reduced Ferrari's points advantage over Verstappen, Leclerc can be satisfied with a very impressive performance in adversity.