As was expected following testing, Red Bull dominated the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix last weekend and Max Verstappen didn’t even need to break sweat, but 41-year-old Fernando Alonso’s charge to his 99th F1 podium kept things interesting for much of the event.
Aside from some brilliant racing – fans have been waiting for about a decade for Alonso and Lewis Hamilton to again go wheel to wheel – the genuine pace of the AMR23 suggests that, finally, a team from the midfield has made the jump into the lead pack.
The concern for the F1 paddock, of course, is that the RB19 already looks uncatchable. As Alex Kalinauckas shows in our in-depth report, circumstances did play to Red Bull’s favour, but a 1-2 in both qualifying and the race is ominous.
We’ve relaunched our GP Driver Ratings for 2023 and new F1 writer Jake Boxall-Legge puts the criteria and the 20 drivers to the test as he hands out this week’s scores.
Elsewhere in the issue, David Malsher-Lopez reports on the IndyCar chaos in St Petersburg that resulted in a late victory for ex-F1 driver Marcus Ericsson. Gary Watkins joins a surprised Anthony Davidson as the 2014 World Endurance champion tries out Peugeot’s Hypercar simulator, while James Newbold talks to some ex-racing drivers about guiding their children through motorsport.
Following a throwaway podcast remark and some fan feedback, we also take on the challenge of ranking the top 10 grand prix cars of the pre-Second World War era. Next week, we meet the even bigger challenge of rating the drivers…
Long-time Aston Martin ace Jonny Adam’s British GT attack in a Mercedes leads our National section, which also includes British Rally Championship news and a debate on whether there should be more club racing during the winter months.
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