Pilot safety at risk
Verstappen and Alonso dominate chaos training
3/31/2023 8:56 am
Rain spoils training for Formula 1 drivers in Australia. World champion Max Verstappen remains calm. Veteran Fernando Alonso indicates that he can be expected again. Dangerous problems with the GPS system cause the first unit to be interrupted.
In the rain in Melbourne, Max Verstappen refrained from risky experiments. After by far the fastest lap in the dry first Formula 1 practice session, the Red Bull star was content with third place in the second practice session on a wet track on Friday. Nevertheless, the 25-year-old Dutchman, in pursuit of his third world title, is the big favorite in the third race of the season on Sunday (7 a.m. / Sky and in the ntv.de live ticker) in Australia.
“We didn’t drive on lap times, but did coordination work after each lap,” said Red Bulls motorsport consultant Helmut Marko on Sky, who also had to acknowledge: “Alonso is very fast, it can still be exciting.” Regarding his own performance, he said: “The car may still be a bit too nervous. It will be a close race, I assume.” Presumably, Verstappen could have driven even faster, but didn’t do that on a day with difficult conditions, especially at the end.
Alonso is unbeatable in the rain
Ex-world champion Fernando Alonso, who finished third in each of the first two races, drove the clear best time in the rainy second practice session. Before the rain got heavier in Melbourne, the 41-year-old landed in his Aston Martin in 1:18.887 minutes, a good four-tenths of a second ahead of Vice World Champion Charles Leclerc in the Ferrari. Verstappen positioned himself behind last year’s winner from Melbourne.
The wet conditions made a normal practice session impossible. Before it got wet, the teams hastily tried to do fast laps. Then the rain slowly got heavier and the dry tires could no longer be used. As a result, the times on the course in Albert Park were not very meaningful overall. Nico Hülkenberg finished ninth in the Haas racing car.
GPS system causes massive problems
Problems with the GPS system meant that the first training session had to be interrupted for several minutes. The difficulties made it impossible for the teams to observe the vehicle position and the approach speeds on the route. Several accidents could only just be avoided. Therefore, for safety reasons, the red flag was waved until the location functioned again without any problems. In addition, the 60-minute unit had to be stopped prematurely because Williams newcomer Logan Sargeant had to park his car right next to the track after technical problems.
Ahead of Sunday’s Grand Prix, when dry conditions and sunshine are expected again, Verstappen leads the overall standings by a point over Perez. So far, both have won one Grand Prix each. Third is Alonso, Hülkenberg is still waiting for his first World Cup point of the year.