Although the Mclaren is a faster car than either the Red Bull or Ferrari, at Spa its speed came in the corners, and the orange cars were unable to close on or pass their rivals on the straights.
Teams and drivers faced a dilemma for Sunday’s race. They could either set their cars up for dry running, with less downforce and more top speed, or give them a higher downforce setup to capitalize on the rain. The thing is, they have to make that decision before qualifying on Saturday, then stick with it. Changes are allowed to setup, but only if you opt to start from the pitlane.
The McLarens took first and second in qualifying, with an amazing lap by Charles Leclerc that pipped Verstappen to third place by 3 milliseconds. Alex Albon got his Williams into a fine fifth place, and Red Bull’s other driver, Yuki Tsunoda—who has a much better relationship with Miekes than he ever did with Horner—made it into seventh just 0.3 seconds behind his otherworldly teammate. Bortotelo repeated his feat, snatching 10th in qualifying.
Not everyone had a good quali, particularly not Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton, who was eliminated among the first drivers for the second time in two days, something the seven-time World Champion described as unacceptable. Mercedes’ young phenom, Kimi Antonelli, who replaced Hamilton, was also eliminated among the first batch, part of a miserable weekend for the Italian who just graduated from high school.
Race day
Sunday morning was greeted with plenty of rain, affecting the support races and then delaying the start of the Grand Prix. Formula 1 has both intermediate and wet grooved tires, which pump gallons of water into the air from the track at speed, creating huge clouds of visibility-obscuring spray that, at a place like Spa, just hang between the trees. It’s this lack of visibility, rather than the wet track itself, that makes F1 so cautious, and so the formation lap was held behind the safety car, at which point the race officials decided to red flag things and wait for some more rain to come through and then leave.
