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Formula 1: Verstappen closed the season with another victory

Formula 1: Verstappen closed the season with another victory

The Mexican Sergio Pérez (Red Bull), third on Sunday, ends the season in third position, three points behind Leclerc at the end of this 22nd and final round of the season.

Red Bull ends an extraordinary season with a victory for its champion, the Dutchman’s 15th, but with a strategic error, which left his team on the brink of placing its drivers in the top two places in the final standings.

The Austrian team will enjoy a good (boreal) winter, despite the tensions in recent weeks between its drivers and its sanction for exceeding the 2021 budget ceiling.

After the last 58 laps of the year and some 306 kilometers in Yas Marina, Formula 1 went into hibernation and one of its great champions, Sebastian Vettel, said goodbye with an anecdotal tenth place. The four-time world champion (2010-2013) competed in his 199th and last Grand Prix.

“It’s amazing to win here again (for the third time in a row), the 15th win of the season”said the 25-year-old Dutchman, after getting the 35th win of his career.

“It has been very nice to do a year like this, I know it will be difficult to reproduce it, but it is a good motivation to try to do the same next year”Verstappen continued.

The other drivers, on the other hand, will have to work more during the preseason to improve their results from March 5, 2023 in Bahrain, on the occasion of the first round of a record-breaking season in racing, with 24 tests.

“I really hope that next year we can step up to fight for the title, we are going to work hard during the winter break.”Leclerc declared.

In the constructors’ championship, Ferrari saved second place, behind the untouchable Red Bull. The Italian team started the year with the idea of ​​fighting for the title. His second driver, the Spanish Carlos Sainz, finished fifth in the World Championship.

Mercedes, after its first victory of the year in Brazil last week, closes a bad year. Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes), seven times world champion, had to abandon this last test due to a mechanical problem.

For the first time in his prolific career he ends a season without winning any Grand Prix and outside the top 5 in the world (6th).

“I can’t wait to stop driving this thing,” acknowledged the former king of the discipline on Saturday.

This year’s Silver Arrow has nothing to do with its predecessors and the team will have to reinvent itself. But Hamilton, 37, also suffered a personal defeat against his teammate.

George Russell, 24, achieved the feat of defeating him in his first season: with a pole position and a victory, he finished fourth in the world championship, while Lewis stayed in sixth position, his worst result in 16 seasons.

Among the manufacturers, Alpine retained its fourth place ahead of McLaren.

F1 will be without a big name next season. The German Sebastian Vettel leaves the discipline at the age of 35 after four titles, obtained from 2010 to 2013 with Red Bull, to dedicate himself to his family and his struggles off the track (ecology and defense of diversity).

His young compatriot, Mick Schumacher, also loses his place at Haas, after two unconvincing seasons.

For his part, Nicholas Latifi (Williams), without a podium and many mistakes in his three seasons, left the elite due to his mediocre results – such as the last place achieved this Sunday.

The 27-year-old driver caused the entry of the famous safety car, which completely changed the race and offered victory and the world title to Verstappen to the detriment of Hamilton, after a series of controversial decisions by the former race director , Michael Massi.

Australian Daniel Ricciardo (McLaren), 9th in Abu Dhabi, also has no team in 2023, but could be Red Bull’s reserve driver.

Finally, the Spanish Fernando Alonso, 41, had to abandon his last GP with Alpine before joining Aston Martin.

The Asturian finished ninth in the final standings, behind his French teammate Esteban Ocon, eighth.

Alonso will be replaced in the French team by the Frenchman Pierre Gasly, who ended his long collaboration with AlphaTauri after finishing in 14th position in the championship.

Source: Ambito

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