Drive to Survive: 2023 races to keep your eye on - Part 1

 

As Drive to Survive Season 6 launches on Netflix in a couple of weeks, all set to cover the 2023 Formula 1 season that has been deemed the most boring in modern times, there are indeed races to look out for even in this season.

The first one would definitely have to be the Jeddah circuit with its controversial time penalties, car troubles up and down the grid, safety car lap and Leclerc and Verstappen starting toward the middle and end of the grid, respectively.

Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

The second race of the season saw Max Verstappen toward the end of the grid following car trouble in Qualifying. This gave teammate Sergio Perez a chance and he stepped right up. But car troubles persisted for both the RedBulls as they raced to victory.

As Perez led the race, there’s edge-of-the-seat racing with Alonso close on his tail in Aston Martin.

Leclerc with a 10-place grid penalty started from P12 to move up to P7 through the 50 laps which saw some Ferrari rivalry as Sainz finished P6, just ahead of his teammate. The failure of Ferrari strategy also begins to become apparent here with the now infamous “Xavi, you need to tell me that before,” from Charles’ radio message about Lewis exiting the pit lane right ahead of him and Leclerc not made aware of the situation by his team.

As teams struggle on Hard and Medium tires, Verstappen cruises along smoothly from P15 to P4 with Russell, Alonso and Perez between him and P1.

Stroll gets a DNF for car trouble and Alonso gets a 5-second penalty for incorrectly lining up on the starting grid. But following Stroll’s DNF on the track, Alonso pits under the safety car and the penalty is carried out pretty smoothly without much disadvantage to Alonso. This comes back around for him again as FIA tries to stick another 10-second penalty on him after the end of the race since the rear jack had touched the car while they were serving the first penalty. Aston Martin fights the second penalty and Alonso gets to keep his P3 on the podium.

But at the end of the day, the very passive aggressive RedBull fight that happens for P1 has to be the top highlight of this race. RedBull clearly has a favoured driver as Checo is asked to drop down in favour of Max and Max is advised to maintain speed. But neither driver pay heed to team messages and power through the last couple of laps. Checo, fortunately, cinches the win for the team while Max still claims the fastest lap in the last lap and points for the same as he comes in with a great recovery from starting in P15 to finishing with a strong P2.

This engaging race goes on to be one of the three races of the season where Max, even though gets to the podium, does not win the Grand Prix.