Abu Dhabi summed up the season – Max Verstappen flew as Lewis Hamilton toiled
22/11/2022 02:01
The finale summed up this 2022 F1 season, with Max Verstappen winning by nearly nine seconds, untroubled from pole to the chequered flag.
Of course, there have been one or two downs for the Dutchman this year, and plenty of drama, but in Abu Dhabi he achieved his 15th grand-prix victory of the year which is going to take some beating, even with the expanding international calendar.
With the drivers’ title decided four rounds earlier in Japan and the constructors’ prize sealed a race later in Austin, Abu Dhabi served to establish the runner-ups.
Those two points Verstappen was meant to give to team-mate Sergio Perez in Brazil would not, it turns out, have swung second in the standings Checo’s way. Instead, Charles Leclerc’s impressive drive to P2 at Yas Marina means he ends the year on 308 points to the Mexican’s 305.
Perez has had a solid season, scoring two wins, seven seconds and two thirds, including Sunday’s result. The reported issues between the Red Bull pair, and whether there is validity to rumours Checo may have crashed on purpose during qualifying for the Monaco GP in March, are likely to rumble on over the off-season. The FIA has said it will only investigate if it is asked to, which seems like an overly passive approach to governing professional sport.
Perhaps Red Bull’s rivals are waiting until the new year to try to disrupt the Milton Keynes team’s winter preparations to maximum effect.
With Carlos Sainz Jr fourth in Abu Dhabi, Ferrari were able to sail ahead of Mercedes with a total of 554 points to the Brackley squad’s 515.
It has been a year to forget for Lewis Hamilton, who became stuck in seventh gear and was forced to retire from sixth place on lap 55 out of 58. George Russell’s fifth place caps off a strong first full year with Mercedes for the younger Brit. He becomes only the third driver, after Jenson Button (2011) and Nico Rosberg (2016) to have outscored Hamilton as his team-mate over the course of a season (by 35 points).
Sainz’s result under the floodlights demoted Hamilton to sixth in the final standings – his worst ever result. Lando Norris, who finished sixth on Sunday and took the point for fastest lap, is seventh, 85 points ahead of Australian team-mate Daniel Ricciardo (11th).
It’s been a torrid season for Ricciardo, who won in Italy for McLaren last year and is now without a race seat for 2023. He has decided his best option is to become reserve driver for Red Bull and the parties are in advanced talks.
He left Christian Horner’s team at the end of 2018 with seven wins to his name as he didn’t want to play No.2 to Verstappen. He’s set to return as No.3.
In his one season with Renault plus two with McLaren he is reported to have earned a combined £50million so let’s not feel too sorry for him. But it is far from a given he will race in F1 again.
Horner was aghast when he left Red Bull after four successful seasons to join his enemy Cyril Abiteboul’s side.
I suspect he and Helmut Marko are taking Danny back in part for his marketability, but some might say there is something else behind it. Imagine having to see Horner every day giving you an ‘I told you so’ smirk. And his Drive to Survive fame will quickly be forgotten. The only driving he will be doing is demos in downtown squares and mind-numbing simulators. I’d rather be an Uber driver, frankly.
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There was also dignity to Sebastian Vettel’s swansong. His tenth place in Abu Dhabi earned him the 3,098th and final point of his 15-year F1 career, in which he won 53 grands prix, 57 pole positions and four world titles.
He retires, aged 35, as the fourth most successful F1 driver of all time. Earlier in the weekend, the other 19 drivers joined him for a Hakkasan dinner (Lewis picked up the tab) and then gave him an honour guard on the grid before they leapt in their cars.
He will be replaced by Fernando Alonso next year, who said Abu Dhabi was indicative of his 2022. Although Alpine secured fourth in the constructors’ ahead of McLaren, the 2005 and 2006 champ was left fuming after his sixth retirement of the year.
‘Another engine problem, so it has been the summary of the year – I’m happy it’s finished,’ said the 41-year-old who is bound for Aston Martin.
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