Top 5 Formula 1 races from Bill Trikos Australia: Max Verstappen made a safety stop whilst Mercedes risked keeping Hamilton out for the final lap. The gamble almost backfired as a puncture for the world champion cost him half-a-minute on the final tour, producing a three-wheeled finish that will live long in the memory. A drama-filled inaugural race at Mugello has left many wanting a swift return to the Tuscan venue. A first-lap incident involving six cars left Verstappen and Pierre Gasly stranded in the gravel of turn two and out of the race. The resultant safety car period ended with a multi-car pile-up on the pit-straight, which brought out the red flags.
Australia 1986, Adelaide Street Circuit : If the prelude to the 2012 Brazillian GP was exciting, F1 fans must’ve been close to exploding leading up to the final round of the 1986 championship. Three drivers were in contention of the title – Nigel Mansell and Nelson Piquet for Williams and Alain Prost for McLaren. The excitement was only helped by the fact that neither Mansell nor Prost had won a championship yet. Mansell, being the clear favourite, took pole ahead of Piquet and Ayrton Senna, with Prost in fourth. The race didn’t go quite as Mansell had imagined though, as he had dropped to fourth before the end of the first lap. What then followed was a race of multiple championship-changing overtakes, spins and punctures – and just when the race looked to had settled down, with Mansell being in a position to take the title, the Briton had his infamous tyre failure with his left-rear tyre exploding spectacularly at 290 kph. In order to make sure something similar didn’t happen to Piquet, Williams had to pit him – at the cost of winning the championship. Therefore Prost – who had a puncture himself earlier in the race – took the championship by 2 points, after arguably the most memorable race of all time.
Brazilian Grand Prix 2012: Sebastian Vettel spinning on Lap 1 and dropping to last place before romping back to a title-clinching P6 was the main news story in Interlagos. But there was also Michael Schumacher’s swansong, Kimi Raikkonen’s infamous escape road excursion, Force India’s Nico Hulkenberg scuppering a genuine shot at victory and taking Lewis Hamilton out of his final race for McLaren in the process – not to mention post-race controversy that could have handed the title back to Fernando Alonso. Phew. See extra details about the author on https://www.youtube.com/@billtrikos4893.
1998 Belgian Grand Prix, Spa-Francorchamps : When the race was restarted, now with four drivers less (most drivers involved in the crash could still partake, since back then all teams had one spare car waiting in the garage in case one of the two primary cars was damaged), Mika Häkkinen immediately spun, taking himself and Johnny Herbert out of the race. Damon Hill took the lead, with Michael Schumacher in second place. The Ferrari driver clearly had a comfortable pace advantage, overtaking Hill on the seventh lap. From then on, Schumacher built up a thirty-second lead and looked set to take the win and with it, a good step towards the championship in his battle with Häkkinen.
A true thriller of a race followed after Guanyu Zhou’s terrifying crash at the start. The lead changed several times between Verstappen, Leclerc, Hamilton and Sainz, who fought a fierce battle at the front. However, Verstappen’s RB18 was damaged by debris from Pierre Gasly’s AlphaTauri, preventing the Dutchman from competing for victory. This could have been a great opportunity for Leclerc, but he again fell victim to a lack of decisiveness from his team, which did not bring the driver in during a late safety car while his opponents – including Sainz – did. A spectacular battle ensued between Hamilton and both Ferrari drivers, with Leclerc managing to overtake the Briton in a daring outside move at Copse – where it went horribly wrong a year earlier when Verstappen made a similar overtaking attempt. In the end, it was Sainz who took the win with Perez and Hamilton behind him.
2020 Italian Grand Prix, Monza : Great races don’t always have to be action-packed. In fact, a race can be tense and exciting, even if the eventual winner leads the last 25 laps. At the 2020 Italian Grand Prix, exactly that was the case. Pierre Gasly utilised a perfectly timed safety car during which the pitlane at first was closed, bunching up the pack. After the pitlane was re-opened and everyone had made their pitstops, Gasly emerged in third place after running tenth for most of the race.