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Formula 1: the 2023 season begins with Red Bull as a rival to beat

Formula 1: the 2023 season begins with Red Bull as a rival to beat

This year, F1 will have three rookie drivers: the Australian Oscar Piastri (21 years old) in the team McLarenhe Dutch Nyck de Vries (28) in AlphaTauri and the american Logan Sargent (22) at Williams, a team that added Argentine Franco Colapinto (19) to its academy.

The contracting market brought other changes: the two-time Spanish champion Fernando Alonso left Alpine and signed as a new midfielder for Aston Martin replacing the retired German four-time champion Sebastian Vettel.

The Asturian will share a team with the Canadian Lance Strollwho hopes to recover from a wrist fracture to start the new calendar, otherwise he will be temporarily replaced by the Brazilian Felipe Drugovich (22).

The French Pierre Gasleyfrom AlphaTauritook Alonso’s seat at Alpine and facilitated the ownership of De Vries -former substitute at Williams- as coequiper of Japanese Yuki Tsunoda in the subsidiary of Red Bull.

The German Nico HulkenbergThe 35-year-old, with a resume of 12 seasons in F1, the last as a relief at Williams, will return as a confirmed driver at Haas, which parted ways with his compatriot Mick Schumacher.

The other two runners who will not be part of the Formula 1 in relation to last year they will be the Canadian Nicholas Latifi and the Australian Daniel Ricciardowho leaves the highest division of world motorsport for the first time since 2011.

The three main F1 teams will not have variations in their formation: Verstappen will continue to be accompanied by the Mexican Sergio “Checo” Perez at Red Bull; Ferrari will keep the Monegasque Charles Leclerc and the Spanish Carlos Sainz; while Mercedes will do the same with Hamilton and the British George Russell.

In the tests carried out last weekend in Sakhir, Red Bull confirmed its favoritism by setting the best times in the first session with Verstappen and in the third with “Checo” Pérez. Only the Chinese Guanyu Zhou (Alfa Romeo) was able to put off the units of the Austrian team on the second day.

The new RB19 model showed an evolution that was recognized by the champion: “The car works quite well, we have tried many things. The training sessions have been very positive and I have enjoyed them. There are some differences, the car drives differently but it’s also related to the tyres.”

“The problem we had last year (at the start of the season) is that the car was overweight and also the weight was poorly distributed. We sorted it out during the year and the performance improved, it became a good race car. This year is a continuation, but we have found things that clearly make the car better. We know what our limitations are,” Verstappen explained after the tests.

He Bahrain Grand Prix will leave this Sunday at 12:00 in Argentina with Star+ transmission, 57 laps over the Sakhir International Circuitwhere Red Bull has not been imposed for 10 years.

The F1 season will be completed according to the following schedule: Saudi Arabian GP (March 19), Australia (April 2), Azerbaijan (April 30), Miami (May 7), San Marino (May 21) , Monaco (May 28), Spain (June 4), Canada (June 18), Austria (July 2) and Great Britain (July 9).

Hungary (July 23), Belgium (July 30), Netherlands (August 27), Monza (September 3), Singapore (September 17), Japan (September 24), Qatar (October 8), Austin (October 22), Mexico (October 29), Brazil (November 5), Las Vegas (November 18) and Abu Dhabi (November 26).

Source: Ambito

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