At the Austrian Grand Prix on Sunday, Walter Botass became the 56th driver in the history of the championship, winning the lead from start to finish, without giving the leader the lead. Of the active riders, Daniel Rikjardo, Max Verstapen, Kimi Raikonen (3 times), Sebastian Fettel (15 times) and Luis Hamilton (19 times, shared a record with Airton Senna) also succeeded.
F1 fans had to wait a very long time before the start of the season – as late as this year (July 5), the season had never started. 217 days passed between the last stage of 2019 and the first stage of this year. It was the third longest off-season after 1950/1951. (267 days) and 1960/1961. of the year (225 days).
In addition, for the first time since 1966, the season opened in Europe. At that time, the first stage took place in Monaco, but the only trip outside Europe was to Mexico and the USA at the end of the season. Since then, the first phase has been entrusted to South Africa, Argentina, Brazil, the United States, Australia and Bahrain.
For the second year in a row, Valteri Botass won the first stage of the season. Last year he managed to beat Hamilton in Australia, but this year the Finnish athlete remained unbeaten in Austria. It should be noted that this track is especially inconvenient for Hamilton, because he has not climbed the podium in Austria for four years in a row.
Lando Norris spent the best weekend of his career. 4th place in the qualifier (and 3rd starting position) is his personal record, but in the race at the age of 20 months, 7 months and 22 days, Norris became the third all-time youngest rider on the podium behind Max Verstapen and Lens Strols, who reached it at the age of 18.
We also managed to get to the point of the fastest lap. The British driver is the second youngest fastest lap winner of all time after Max Verstapen, who reached it in 2016 in Brazil at the age of 19.
Only 11 drivers managed to get to the finish line, while 9 cars had technical defects. The last time so few riders saw the checkered finish flag was in Canada in 2014, but the all-time record was set in 1996 in Monaco, when only three riders finished.
Nicolas Latifi was the only rider to finish without points. Nevertheless, the Williams team debut in his first run repeated the all-time best result of his talented teammate George Russell.
This is the first time since 2009 that only one debutant has participated in the first stage of the season. 11 years ago it was Sebastien Buemi, but during the season, Haim Algersuari, Roman Grožan and Kamui Kobayashi were also given the opportunity. If no new riders are attracted during the season, this will be the first season in history when only one rider will make his debut during the year.
During the race in Austria, several F1 fans felt ‘Already seen’ effect – just like last year in Brazil, Alex Albon, after a relatively chaotic race with several phases of a safety car, was on his way to his first podium of honor (perhaps even victory) when he collided with Luis Hamilton. Just like in Brazil, the Albon car slipped and the Red Bull driver was left without points while Hamilton finished in the top three, receiving a 5-second penalty, losing several seats and allowing the McLaren driver to win the first podium of his career.
The fastest laps of the Austrian GP
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