F1 Talk: No championship fight but Spectacular Battles on the track – 2019 Season Review

Sadly, the 2019 FIA Formula One World Championship gave us no championship fight with Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton looking almost certain to win both titles after just a handful of races.

Prior to Canada, the season was pretty dull to say the least with Mercedes taking win after win and dominating multiple races.

Things quickly shifted though and as a sweetener for the lack of a championship battle, Austria, Britain, Germany, Hungary, Belgium and Italy provided some of the best racing F1 has seen for a long time with a few of those races proving to be all-time classics.

To kickstart the 2019 season, Valtteri Bottas eased to victory in Melbourne which ignited plenty of ‘Valtteri 2.0’ talk. Realisitically, Bottas was never going to challenge Hamilton over a season though.

Unlike some, I thought he had almost no chance of beating Hamilton this year, it was just the media trying to create a rivalry or battle since Ferrari and Red Bull were already very far behind after just eight Grand Prix.

Nevertheless, after Baku, Hamilton and Bottas had won two races each with the latter leading the championship by a solitary point.

But, Hamilton took four wins on the bounce and stretched his lead to a relatively comfortable margin going into the summer period.

When Ferrari and Red Bull are able to fight with Mercedes, Hamilton raises his game and Bottas does not have that extra gear or the racecraft that Hamilton has to keep fighting for the win even if the Mercedes is not necessarily the fastest car.

Hamilton thrives under the pressure when he knows he has to execute a perfect race of perfect weekend to have any chance of victory. Look at Hungary, Belgium and Italy for example.

Only Hamilton had the speed to fight with Max Verstappen and the Ferrari drivers in those respective races with Bottas nowhere to be seen because he has nothing left to give.

That is the difference between the great and the good or the difference between a multiple world champion and a multiple race-winner.

With the championship over very early, there was so much talk about how this was the ‘worst season in F1 history’ but things to a sudden change during the summer.

Verstappen’s comeback drive in Austria was the race of the year in my opinion as he recovered from a nightmare start to overtake cars one by one without any help from a safety car or virtual safety car to give Honda their first win since 2006.

It was perhaps one of the greatest races in the turb-hybrid era and drives such as Verstappen’s will be looked back on in the coming years as something special.

Silverstone followed and Verstappen and Charles Leclerc made the headlines again as they battled wheel to wheel for lap after lap, putting the hundreds of thousands of fans on their feet as they risked it all at over 180MPH.

The battling was sensational and the racecraft from both showed why F1 is in more than good hands after Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel leave the sport. Hamilton himself had a good tussel with Bottas although the TV director spoiled things as we will all remember when he overtook Bottas around the outside at Luffield.

Then, there was Germany. The first wet race for nearly two years and chaos errupted. Driver after driver made mistake after mistake and things climaxed when Leclerc crashed from a potentially net-lead which resulted in a safety car.

Mercedes decided to pit Hamilton as the rain began to fall but Hamilton crashed out himself just meters away from Leclerc’s stranded car and came into the pits earlier than expected.

The Mercedes crew were not ready and it resulted in a pitstop from the early days of F1, 51 seconds – ironic that the Silver Arrows were celebrating 125 years in motorsport that weekend.

Even the race winner, Verstappen had a spin whilst Vettel came from the back to get onto the podium along with a jubilent Daniil Kvyat. The scenes were incredible and so many drivers will regret a missed opportunity that weekend as there was so much up for grabs but only a few drivers were able to take full advantage.

Hungary was another brilliant race too. A different sort of Grand Prix, one for the purists which I enjoyed thoroughly. Verstappen and Hamilton went toe to toe yet again and they put on a fantastic show as they battled and pushed each other into a league of their own. Hamilton eventually came out on top through a great strategy move and excellent execution.

In the summer-break, Pierre Gasly was demoted to Toro Rosso – a move that was fully justified since Gasly has been underwhelming to say the least in the first half of the year. His pain, was Alexander Albon’s gain as he moved to Red Bull in his rookie season.

The sport was hurt by the tragic death of Anthoine Hubert during the Belgian Grand Prix weekend and Leclerc’s maiden win could not have been more fitting as he hung on to the lead from Hamilton after Hamilton brilliantly battled the Ferrari drivers.

Ferrari continued to show their strength at Monza as they won there for the first time in nine years to the delight of the Tifosi. After a farcical qualifying session which saw all ten drivers in Q3 crawling around at walking pace before their final flying laps, Leclerc held off a charging Hamilton with a robust defence.

The scenes were incredible and Monza was one of the highlights of the year.

Singapore was expected to see Ferrari fall back but the Prancing Horses stunned everyone by dominating the weekend and scoring a 1-2 with Vettel taking his one and only win of 2019. It came from nowhere and is still a mystery as to how Ferrari went from finishing over a minute behind in Budapest to taking pole position and the win in Singapore, three races later.

Mercedes hit back though in Russia despite Ferrari locking out the front row and looking set for a 1-2. Sochi was the only time that Ferrari looked to have a genuine race pace advantage over Mercedes over the course of the whole season but a virtual safety car ironically caused by a terminal issue for Vettel means Hamilton took a fortunate win with Bottas second.

Ferrari took four consecutive front row lockouts following Japan and Mexico but lost out to the Silver Arrows on both occasions.

I always say that if you lock out the front row, you should be able to win the race with one of your cars because you can play the team game and with overtaking still reasonably tough in modern F1, you should be able to hold off our rivals unless they have a substantial pace advantage.

Hamilton wrapped up his sixth title in America with a great drive to take second place and cement legendary status as he edges closer to Michael Schumacher’s win and championship records.

The last 20 laps of the Brazilian Grand Prix were crazy for F1 and it ended up with Pierre Gasly on the podium after a drag race to the line versus Hamilton. Even prior to the last part of the race, there were some sensational battles and seeing Hamilton vs. Verstappen is simply box office.

Abu Dhabi was anti-climatic to say the least and 2019 was not as underwhelming as things first seemed. For Mercedes, they surprised many following Ferrari’s dominance in winter testing whilst Ferrari should be disappointed that they still lack operationally compared to Mercedes despite having a car that should have given Mercedes a run for its money in 2019.

Red Bull struggled yet again early on but will be impressed by the progression of Honda and the very few reliability issues that they have suffered. Alexander Albon did enough to secure a Red Bull seat in 2020 with his rapid improvement earning him the right to drive alongside Verstappen.

Ferrari will be worried about a potential fall out between Vettel and Leclerc as Vettel looked to crack under the pressure on far too many occasions in 2019 whilst Leclerc was on it straight away.

And Mercedes are still the team to beat. Super consistent, operationally excellent and a team of people behind the scenes who are doing something special as the Silver Arrows won their sixth constructors’ title and sixth drivers’ title in a row.

Unprecedented stuff and it should be appreciated more by the motorsport community.