Talking points ahead of the Belgian Grand Prix
Thursday, 27 July 2023
Does anyone want to stake their claim to be F1®'s second-best team at Spa, the final hit-out before the mid-season break? A fast-rising Aussie could have a say, while one of the sport's greats celebrates a milestone while not slowing down…
The second leg of F1®'s latest double-header comes at one of the most revered tracks on the calendar, with this weekend's Formula 1® Belgian Grand Prix (July 28-30) marking the unofficial halfway stage of the season before the sport's annual summer shutdown.
Spa-Francorchamps hosts round 12 of the 22-round season and the third of six Sprint events this year. Runaway championship leader Max Verstappen is chasing an eighth straight victory, which would leave him behind only Sebastian Vettel (nine consecutive wins in 2013) for the longest run of sustained success in F1® history.
Red Bull's pace so far in 2023 – it has won all 11 races and has led a staggering 96 per cent of the 680 total race laps between Verstappen and teammate Sergio Perez – has been more than well documented. But it's Verstappen's reliability that has been just as eye-catching, the Dutchman's win in Hungary last time out his 30th straight race in the points, 23 of those being wins.
So let's leave the blisteringly fast and seemingly-bulletproof Red Bull there and turn our attention to three other talking points we're watching ahead of Spa.
Ageless Alonso's milestone
Few in F1® history have done it as well for as long as Fernando Alonso, the Aston Martin man's 367th F1® start at Spa set to come one day after his 42nd birthday in what has been his best season in many years.
Alonso still sits third in the drivers' standings behind – well, you know – at the halfway stage of the season despite Aston coming back to the pack in recent races, his ninth place in Hungary last weekend his worst result of the year. So how is the indefatigable Spaniard still doing it? Consistency is one thing – he's finished all 11 races in the points – and being in the mix from lap one at every race has been key. Halfway through 2023, he's the only driver to make Q3 at every race – that's an achievement even Verstappen or Perez can't claim.
It's been over a decade since Alonso won a Grand Prix, and while a trip back to the podium's top step would be a stretch, it wouldn't be unprecedented. Six drivers have won races aged 42 or over, Australia's own Jack Brabham the most recent of them at the 1970 South African Grand Prix.
Second-best? That's anyone's guess
Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff spoke for most of us when he described the modern-day ground-effect cars as being "an enigma" after Lewis Hamilton took pole position in Hungary last weekend, with the one constant other than Red Bull winning this year being wondering who will be their closest challenger from one race to the next.
Six of the 10 teams have had a driver finish on the podium this season, while McLaren – all but anonymous in the first eight races – come to Spa off back-to-back podiums for Lando Norris at Silverstone and the Hungaroring. And what to make of Alfa Romeo, who was fifth (Zhou Guanyu) and seventh (Valtteri Bottas) on the Hungary grid, Zhou's result the team's best qualifying in 11 years?
The 7.004km Spa layout – the longest in F1® – is a very different proposition to the tight and twisty Hungaroring, meaning picking who might step up to make Red Bull sweat this weekend comes from a deep pool of contenders. If Toto doesn't know, you're excused for being equally confused …
What of the Aussies?
The two Australians on the F1® grid – we're still enjoying writing that – come to Spa with very different goals in mind, after Oscar Piastri and Daniel Ricciardo blended optimism with thoughts of what might have been in Hungary last Sunday.
Piastri looked like a seasoned F1® veteran, not a driver in his 11th start, when he slotted in seamlessly behind Verstappen for the opening stint of the race in Budapest; fifth place when you've spent 18 laps in second would have been tough to swallow, but the tyre management lessons the McLaren rookie learned will hold him in good stead the longer 2023 goes. It would surprise few if McLaren, so effective through Silverstone's swooping corners two races ago, aren't in the mix again, and a Piastri podium looks more of a possibility than a pipedream before the year is out.
For Ricciardo, a return to the circuit where he won for Red Bull in his coming-of-age season in 2014 doubles as a chance to bank more data in his second weekend for Scuderia AlphaTauri, and he'll be hoping for an uncompromised race after falling to the back at his comeback in Hungary, skittled by an overly-ambitious Zhou at Turn 1.
Beating established teammate Yuki Tsunoda in both qualifying and the race in Hungary was a solid start, and while Spa's layout may expose AlphaTauri's paucity of downforce, expect the Honey Badger to snap up any opportunity that presents itself before the summer hiatus.
The Formula 1® Belgian Grand Prix 2023 will be available to watch live on Foxtel and Kayo. See our What time does the 2023 Belgian Grand Prix start in Australia article for timings.
