Tag Archives: Carlos Sainz

2019 F1 Grand Prix of France — Results & aftermath

Hamilton romps to dominant victory in France, Bottas a distant P2; Leclerc P3, Vettel P5 as Ferrari’s hopes dim

Mercedes ace Lewis Hamilton was untouchable at Circuit Paul Riccard as he went on to dominate the French Grand Prix from pole and blow away the field for a dominant win on Sunday. On the hunt for his remarkable sixth F1 title the Englishman scored the Grand Slam in this eighth round of the World Championship — pole position, fastest lap, leading all race laps and the win — and aced his nearest competitor, teammate Valtteri Bottas in ostensibly the same equipment, by a whopping 18 seconds to the checkered flag. It was Hamilton’s fourth win on the trot and he has now won six out of the eight contests so far in 2019 and already leads Bottas by 36 Drivers’ points. That’s bad news for anyone hoping that either Bottas or Ferrari would take down the most dominant driver of this new turbo hybrid era, as man and machine once again look to be in perfect harmony and Hamilton is beginning to demoralize his closest rivals.

Pics courtesy GrandPrix247.com

With Bottas’s performance fading after a splitting the first four races with his peerless Silver Arrows rival, Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel is also showing signs of losing the metal war to Lewis. After a controversial penalty at the Canadian GP stripped him of victory two weeks ago the German four-time champ seemed to be suffering the psychological hangover during a very poor qualifying run on Saturday that saw Vettel related to a P7 start from the grid. While Vettel raced hard and kept it clean he was only able to claw back two positions to come home a rather tepid P5. His younger teammate Charles Leclerc finished where he qualified, P3, an encouraging sign for the Monegasque after some inconsistent quali runs lately. But it was all a bit of cold comfort for the legendary Scuderia from Maranello, who have been outclassed for the most part by mighty Mercedes and have seen potential victories in Bahrain and Canada undone by mechanical reliability and driver error respectively. While the Ferrari camp were still keeping their heads high and talking up their chances for major improvements going forward it’s becoming harder to see that happening because Mercedes, already the dominant car, will hardly be resting on their laurels as the summer moves along.

Further back in the pack, Max Verstappen did his usual fine work to finish ahead of Vettel in P4 but the Red Bull simply doesn’t have the pace to compete for victory unless one of the front running teams has a major mishap. Continue reading →

2019 F1 Grand Prix of France — Qualifying results

Mercedes’ Hamilton seizes pole at Paul Ricard to keep momentum going, fading Bottas P2; Leclerc third fastest for Ferrari but Vettel’s woes continue with subpar P7 time

Mercedes ace Lewis Hamilton extended his hot streak by laying down a dominant lap for pole at the colorful and quite windy Circuit Paul Ricard during Saturday qualifying for tomorrow’s French Grand Prix. The English championship points leader came in having won three in a row and five out of the first seven rounds. That torrid run includes his controversial victory at Montreal two weeks ago that saw Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel demoted from a dominant win via a time penalty for unsafe reentry after cutting a chicane. Hamilton is not only looking to demoralize and psych out Vettel but also put his ambitious teammate Valterri Bottas back in his place. The Finn looked up for a Rosberg-like challenge to Hamilton’s supremacy after splitting two of the first four GPs to start the season. But since then Bottas has seen his Mercedes stablemate pull away in dominant fashion and he could do no better than a slightly shaky P2 time as the mistral seemed to play its tricks on his Silver Arrow here in the south of France.

For Ferrari, it was another mixed bag in a season in which they have struggled to get both their cars to perform at a high level simultaneously during qualifying. Continue reading →

2019 F1 Grand Prix of Canada — Qualifying results

Vettel snatches pole from Hamilton as Ferrari come to play in Canada; Leclerc P3 while Bottas struggles in P6, Verstappen bounced in Q2

For the first time since Bahrain all the talk of Ferrari’s hypothetical straight line speed advantage over Mercedes finally materialized as Sebastian Vettel pipped Lewis Hamilton for pole at Circuit Gilles-Villenueve in Saturday qualifying for the Canadian Grand Prix. The Mercedes man had looked supreme throughout Q3 and it once again appeared that Hamilton would crush whatever fragile dreams of competitiveness Ferrari harbored by setting purple sector after purple sector. But Vettel and the fabled Sucderia had the last laugh today when the German four-time champion put in a blistering effort as the seconds ran down in Q3 to best Hamilton by two-tenths of a second. It was Vettel’s first pole since the German Grand Prix last year and a much needed boost for both the team and Vettel, who has looked less than fully confident at times this season. Obviously, Seb will also need to covert his pole into a victory on Sunday to jump start what is beginning to look like a hopeless campaign for Ferrari against the might of Mercedes. And look for Hamilton, who starts along side him in P2, to try every trick in his book to overhaul Vettel early and once again show that he and his Silver Arrow are an unstoppable force.

Vettel’s teammate Charles Leclerc qualified P3 and seemed to lose a little confidence as the day wore on. But it was nothing like the travails that afflicted Valtteri Bottas, Hamilton’s Mercedes teammate and nearest points rival. With Hamilton having won the last two contests on the trot after Bottas’ victory in Azerbaijan, the Finn is starting to look a little wobbly in the face of the Englishman’s  onslaught. Continue reading →

2019 F1 Grand Prix of Monaco — Results & aftermath

Mercedes’ Hamilton holds on to prevail in tense Monaco GP ahead of aggressive P2 Verstappen; but Red Bull driver pushed off podium by pit penalty to elevate Vettel & Bottas

Mercedes ace Lewis Hamilton drove one of the most tense and nervy races of his illustrious career to earn his third Monaco GP victory on the tight and twisty streets of Monte Carlo on Sunday. Saddled with increasingly worn and ineffective Medium Pirelli tires since way back on Lap 12 of this 78 lap street fight Hamilton was also boxed in by a mandatory one-stop strategy, as all his nearest rivals were running a run-stopper but also with the benefit of being on the more durable Hard Pirelli rubber. There was a surprising lack of pace difference between the two compounds — and also a lack of durability difference in the Soft tires compared to the other two tires. That enabled teams up and down the order to gamble but it almost paid the greatest jackpot for Red Bull’s Max Verstappen. Running on the hardest tires on offer, Vertspappen hounded Hamilton at nearly every corner of this legendary circuit for lap after lap in the second half of the race. But at Monaco it is also legendarily difficult to pass and despite Hamilton’s increasingly desperate radio communication with the Mercedes pit wall about the impossibility of finishing the race on his blistering, grip-less rubber his engineers talked him through his most panicky moments and reminded the English 5-time World Champion that catching and passing are two completely different things in Monte Carlo. Thus, even as Verstappen reeled him in as the laps wound down, finally making a dive to the inside on Lap 77 as the two cars screamed out of the tunnel and towards the Nouvelle Chicane, Hamilton was able to close the door abruptly on the Dutch hard-charger, sending the Red Bull spearing offline through the chicane while Hamilton still had enough grip to get beak on line and on form for the high speed swimming pool section. After all that white-knuckle race and tire management from the front that was the race and Hamilton held on for a hard-earned win on a weekend where the Formula 1 world mourned the loss of 3-time champ and all around legend Niki Lauda, whose ties to the current Mercedes team run deep. It was a fitting and fittingly gritty tribute to the great Austrian champion and also secured Hamilton his most decisive points lead of the season.

Pics courtesy GrandPrix247.com

Verstappen was really only able to hound Hamilton from that P2 position because his team released him prematurely on a fateful Lap 11 Safety Car scramble for fresh rubber that saw Vertsppen launch into the other Mercedes driver, Valtteri Bottas, as he was heading down pit lane. That led to an extra stop for Bottas for Hard tires after his brand new Mediums suffered a slow puncture due to the contact with the hasty Red Bull. It also led inevitably to a 5-second time penalty for the Red Bull man that insured that even though Vertsppen finished the race in P2 he was demoted off the podium and was classified as the fourth place finisher. That redounded to the benefit not only of the victimized Bottas, who was elevated to the podium and P3, but also Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel who inherited Vertspapen’s second place finish.  Vettel, who seemed to be lurking behind Hamilton and Verstappen waiting for the dicing duo to take each other out and thus inherent the lead, was nonetheless content with his P2, which somewhat saved the day for the Scuderia.

Their young, talented and somewhat erratic number two driver Charles Leclerc had a miserable weekend all around and failed to finish on Sunday. Continue reading →

2019 F1 Grand Prix of Monaco — Qualifying results

Mercedes’ Hamilton asserts authority with blistering pole lap to best Bottas; Verstappen takes P3 ahead of Vettel, Leclerc fails to make it out of Q3 for Ferrari

Mercedes’ ostensible number two driver Valtteri Bottas set down a marker early in Q3 during Saturday qualifying for the Monaco Grand Prix that seemed sure to net the Finn pole position for the race. It was a track record time of just over 70 seconds that the tricky Monte Carlo circuit had never seen before and Bottas appeared to have the measure of his teammate and only real rival, Lewis Hamilton, as well as the rest of the field. But personifying the old saying you’ve got to take the belt from then champ, Hamilton put together a pure blinder as time ran down in the last quali session to pip Bottas by a mere .09 seconds and secure his second career pole at this legendary and legendarily tight street circuit. At a place where starting track position often determines the winner, the 5-time and current reigning champion showed once again that when the big prizes are on the line he still can put it all together and perform at a higher level than anyone else in this era of Formula 1.

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen was quick all weekend long and finally ran a nice clean qualifying session at what had been a personal bogey track for the Dutchman to secure P3 on the grid, besting Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel who did well to grab P4 despite crashing in free practice 3 earlier on Saturday morning and brushing the wall more than once while pushing hard in qualifying. But that did only a little to offset Ferrari’s woes after the team badly miscalculated in Q1 and failed to get their second driver Charles Leclerc out in time to set a fast enough time to escape the normally perfunctory Top 15 cutoff line. The native Monegasque, who perhaps caused some team confusion by missing a mandatory call to the weigh-bridge and then had to be pushed back down the pit lane manually to make the random stewards exam, was thus saddled with a P16 time and will only start P15 due to others’ penalties. Leclerc was understandably miffed after the mishap and will have it all to do in the race to try and make a decent showing and save the blushes of the Scuderia.

Vertsppen’s Red Bull teammate did reasonably well to qualify P5 behind Vettel, while Kevin Magnusen did a terrific job for team Haas to set the sixth fastest time. Daniel Ricciardo was likewise the lone Renault to make the Top 10 in P7 and the two Toro Rossos of Daniil Kvyat and rookie Alexander Albon showed real pace at this high downforce street circuit to qualify P8 and P10 respectively. Spaniard Carlos Sainz used his experience to push his McLaren up to P9, well; ahead of his rookie teammate Lando Norris, who could do no better than P12.

Top 10 qualifiers for the Monaco GP:

POS NO DRIVER CAR Q1 Q2 Q3 LAPS
1 44 Lewis Hamilton MERCEDES 1:11.542 1:10.835 1:10.166 28
2 77 Valtteri Bottas MERCEDES 1:11.562 1:10.701 1:10.252 27
3 33 Max Verstappen RED BULL RACING HONDA 1:11.597 1:10.618 1:10.641 19
4 5 Sebastian Vettel FERRARI 1:11.434 1:11.227 1:10.947 27
5 10 Pierre Gasly RED BULL RACING HONDA 1:11.740 1:11.457 1:11.041 24
6 20 Kevin Magnussen HAAS FERRARI 1:11.865 1:11.363 1:11.109 24
7 3 Daniel Ricciardo RENAULT 1:11.767 1:11.543 1:11.218 25
8 26 Daniil Kvyat SCUDERIA TORO ROSSO HONDA 1:11.602 1:11.412 1:11.271 30
9 55 Carlos Sainz MCLAREN RENAULT 1:11.872 1:11.608 1:11.417 30
10 23 Alexander Albon SCUDERIA TORO ROSSO HONDA 1:12.007 1:11.429 1:11.653 31

Complete qualifying results amiable via Formula1.com.

Tomorrow’s race airs live on ESPN beginning at 9AM Eastern here in the States. Hope to see you then to see how the front row duel between Hamilton and Bottas shakes out or if Vettel or Vertsappen might get the better of the two Mercedes men!

2019 F1 Grand Prix of Spain — Results & aftermath

Hamilton romps to victory in Spain, bests P2 Bottas for 5th consecutive Mercedes 1-2; Verstappen claims last podium position in P3; indecisive Ferrari miss out

With hís teammate Valtteri Bottas proving that he is a genuine threat for the World Championship this year, the veteran Mercedes ace Lewis Hamilton showed his ability to raise his game in the face of stiff competition and dominated the Spanish Grand Prix on Sunday. Bottas, who was coming off an inspiring victory in Baku, Azerbaijan a fortnight ago, looked poised to extend his momentum after snatching pole in Saturday qualifying. But Hamilton got the better start from P2 when the lights went out and out raced his Finnish rival going down into pivotal Turn 1 of the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. Bottas would later blame a fritzy clutch for his boggy beginning and the Ferrari of Sebastian Vettel also pulled alongside him, momentarily making Bottas the meat in the sandwich. Hamilton then got the superior launch off the corner and pulled away, Bottas’ Silver Arrow squirmed under the combined break-acceleration effort required to avoid the two cars surrounding hime but was able to control his car with fast hands while Vettel locked up and flat-spotted his right front tire. That moment would prove to be the decisive moment for all three men in the contest.

Pics courtesy GrandPrix247.com

Hamilton pulled a gap almost immediately, Bottas was able to recover enough to hold his P2 position and Vettel quickly slipped back into the clutches of his junior teammate, Charles Leclerc. And here Ferrari’s pit wall indecision would once again come back to bite them. With Leclerc harassing Vettel and clearly looking like the faster car as his German teammate struggled with that flat spot vibration, the Scuderia delayed the team order for their drivers to swap positions until Lap 12. And by then both Mercedes had disappeared into the distance. Vettel, who was practically pleading to pit for fresh rubber from the time he damaged his tires on the opening lap, was brought in on Lap 20 to get off the starting Soft Pirellis and onto the Medium compound tires. The stop was actually slow by about 2 seconds by modern F1 standards but the four-time World Champ promptly set the fastest laps of the race, proving that the Mediums were not greatly inferior to the Softs.

Meanwhile Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, who started from P4 and passed Vettel after the German’s initial opening lap bobble, pitted a lap later on 21 going from Soft to Soft, obviously signaling that he would be doing a two-stopper. Continue reading →

2019 F1 Grand Prix of Azerbaijan — Results & aftermath

Bottas brilliant in Baku for the win, Hamilton P2 to extend Mercedes mastery; Vettel P3 for frustrated Ferrari

Valtteri Bottas entered the 2019 season vowing to be less of a wingman to his peerless 5-time World Champion teammate Lewis Hamilton and more of a threat to him for the title. So far in this young season Bottas has made good on his promise. After pipping Hamilton for pole position, Bottas was able to hold off the hard charging Hamilton on the opening lap of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix on Sunday at the alternately wide and tight Baku City Street circuit. It was something the Finn was unable to do in China two weeks ago but this time he kept his elbows out in a respectful but forceful manner and kept Hamilton behind him. Following that crucial first lap, the pace of Bottas’ Mercedes was untouchable by the rest of the field, including his elite teammate. Bottas was able to pull away and manage the race from the front, surviving some tricky tire strategy, as well as Hamilton’s best efforts, to eventually romp to the win by a healthy 1.5 seconds. That avenged Bottas’ heartbreaking loss here last year when a late lap puncture denied him certain victory and he now has two wins to bookend Hamilton’s own brace. Bottas leads the Englishman by a single point in the Driver’s standings, which he scored by taking fastest lap in Melbourne along with the victory there. The race in Azerbaijan, Round 4 of the Championship, also highlighted a dominant start by team Mercedes and marked their fourth consecutive 1-2 finish to start the year.

That is bad news for Ferrari and fans of the fabled Scuderia. After all the talk of the Prancing Horses having the pace advantage over the Silver Arrows, Ferrari has yet to prove that in a race this year. Mercedes appears able to turn up the performance without sacrificing reliability and they have two drivers who almost never make mistakes. Both those shortcomings bit Ferrari in Baku. Wile looking like the fastest overall during each round of practice, Ferrari’s young phenom Charles Leclerc binned his car into the TecPro barriers at the tricky Castle complex during Saturday qualifying. Yeoman’s work by the team’s mechanics enabled Leclerc to start with a healthy car on the grid on Sunday and he was elevated to P8 by the time the race started due to others’ penalties. But it was a far cry from a possible pole and put the Monegasque on an alternate tire strategy from the rest of the frontrunners, with Leclerc’s Prancing Horse starting on the Medium Pirelli’s while the other top 10 began on the softs. So Leclerc would obviously run a longer first stint and for a while it looked like the alternate strategy just might pay off with unexpectedly good results, as the Soft rubber of those around him expired much more quickly than expected.

Pics courtesy GrandPrix247.com

Leclerc made a passel of passes through the midfield to get to P5 by Lap 7 and by the time Hamilton finished off the round of pit stops for the top 3 on Lap 14 Leclerc inherited the race lead. But Ferrari may have gotten greedy — they were also understandably worried about the life of the Soft tires to close the race to be fair — and kept Leclerc out on that first set of Medium tires all the way to Lap 34. Continue reading →

2019 F1 Grand Prix of Bahrain — Qualifying results

Leclerc scores maiden pole in Bahrain ahead of P2 Vettel to lead Ferrari rebound & front row lockout; Mercedes’ Hamilton only third fastest

After showing disappointingly pedestrian pace at Formula 1’s season opener in Australia two weeks ago, Ferrari rebounded strongly during Saturday qualifying for Round Two at the Sakhir Circuit in Bahrain. And it was their precocious first year driver Charles Leclerc who bested not only the field for his first career pole position but also his 4-time World Champion teammate, Sebastian Vettel. Under the bright lights of this night race in the affluent Persian Gulf nation it was the Monégasque Leclerc who shone the brightest, setting a new track record of 1:27.866, eclipsing Vettel’s previous record lap from last year. With Ferrari back to the form they showed in preseason testing, the Scuderia dominated all practice sessions and then locked out the front row when it really mattered. And their 21-year-old ostensible Number 2 blasted a shot across not only Mercedes’ bow but also senior stablemate Vettel’s. The braintrust at Maranello have to be feeling much better about taking the fight to Mighty Mercedes than they did a fortnight ago after their underwhelming run in Melbourne. Now it’s up to the Prancing Horses to run away from the Silver Arrows come race day tomorrow and prove that it really will be game on for the Constructors’ Title in 2019.

Mercedes were clearly second best on Saturday after dominating the debut race of the season which led to Bottas’ impressive win. Lewis Hamilton did out-qualify Bottas P3 to P4 but then he also led the field from pole at Albert Park and was outclassed by his Finnish teammate. So look for Hamilton to work very hard to best Bottas tomorrow even if Mercedes do not have the pace to challenge for the win against what looks to be a resurgent Ferrari at a track that really seems to suit their blood red cars. Continue reading →

2018 F1 Grand Prix of Abu Dhabi — Results & aftermath

Hamilton finishes historic season in style with dominant win in Abu Dhabi; Vettel runner-up, Verstappen P3

Newly minted 5-time World Champion Lewis Hamilton resisted complacency and instead turned in another vintage Hammertime performance to cap off a historically successful 2018 Formula 1 season. Mercedes’ ace lead the race from pole, dominating from the front, and never faced a serious challenge in Sunday’s in Abu Dhabi Grand Prix from futuristic Yas Marina, the final race of the year. Hamilton picked up his 11th victory out of 21 contests and scored his record-setting 408th championship point. For as close as the season seemed at just a little over the halfway mark, Hamilton and Mercedes dominated Ferrari down the stretch en route to the team’s fifth Constructors’ title on the trot since the start of the current hybrid formula. Ferrari have got to be hoping that next year’s rule tweaks can slow the German juggernaut down in 2014. The fabled Scuderia were left pondering the ashes of another failed campaign and wondering where exactly they lost their way not long after the summer break. The Prancing Horses seemed poised to take their challenge to Mercedes’ dominance down to the wire after Vettel’s victory at Spa in August. But then Hamilton reeled off 6 wins in the last eight races with Kimi Raikkonen at COTA in the United States the only Ferrari driver standing on the top step during that amazing run. There will have to be a lot of midnight oil burnt at Maranello during the short winter break if Ferrari and Vettel are to have any hope of catching up to what is now officially a dynastic championship run by Hamilton and mighty Mercedes.

Pics courtesy GrandPrix247.com

The race got off to a scary start on the opening lap when the Renault of Nico Hulkenberg and the Haas of Romain Grosjean touched wheels while fighting for the same piece of real estate, sending Hulkenberg’s car airborne and barrel rolling several time before ending up in the energy-dispersing “Lego” barriers upside down. The helpless Hulkenberg was extracted from the car after some time and emerged unscathed, though the time it took to get him out did bring home the double-edged nature of the Halo system. Things might not have been so positive had his car been on fire during all the time it took to get Hulkenberg out of there safely.

Thankfully, though, the German was unhurt and the race resumed when the Safety Car came in at the end of Lap 4. Hamilton once again vaulted to the lead on the restart, while the Red Bull of Max Verstappen began making up places at a furious pace after software issues at the very start of the race saw the Dutchman drop like a stone from his initial P6 position on the grid. Continue reading →

2018 F1 Grand Prix of Mexico — Qualifying results

Ricciardo seizes pole in Mexico with mega lap, leads Red Bull front row lockout pipping Verstappen in P2; Hamilton P3 ahead of Vettel in P4

Just when it seemed that Max Verstappen would earn his first ever Formula 1 pole in Saturday qualifying from Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez in Mexico City, the talented wunderkind saw that elusive goal snatched from him by his Red Bull teammate. Daniel Ricciardo bested Verstappen’s seemingly untouchable sub 1:15-second fast lap by 3-one hundredths, leaving the Aussie giddy with a new track record and the 21-year-old Dutchman suddenly deflated. After looking the fastest man up until that the very last moments of Q3 Vertsapen was also looking to become the youngest pole-sitter in the sport’s history. But that dream will have to wait at least a couple of more weeks. Despite Verstappen’s disappointment, Red Bull were thrilled to have the front row lockout at a track that really seems to suit their chassis and Ricciardo was especially elated. They may have issues holding those high flying positions in the race, however, because the Red Bulls’ straight line speed is still not nearly as good as Mercedes’ or Ferrari’s, not to mention the doubt added by Ricciardo’s recent string of DNFs due to poor reliability.

Speaking of Mercedes, their ace and points leader took another step towards clinching his fifth World Championship, taking the checkered flag just behind the two Red Bulls and in front of his last remaining title rival, Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel. Hamilton will line up P3 on the grid right beside Vettel in P4 and if he scores a mere 5 points in the race he will mathematically eliminate his German rival and claim the 2018 Championship. That makes their respective getaways tomorrow all the more intriguing, especially considering Vettel’s recent propensity for crashing into his nearest opponents. Hamilton’s teammate, Valtteri Bottas, had the fifth fastest time, while Vettel’s stablemate and last week’s race winner in Texas, Kimi Raikkonen, could do no better than P6.

Further down the order, Renault’s Nico Hulkenberg and Carlos Sainz qualified P7 and P8 respectively, while the two Saubers both made it into Q3 for the first time since Russia. Charles Leclerc set the ninth fastest time while Marcus Ericsson will start in P10.

Top 10 qualifiers for the Mexican GP:

POS NO DRIVER CAR Q1 Q2 Q3 LAPS
1 3 Daniel Ricciardo RED BULL RACING TAG HEUER 1:15.866 1:15.845 1:14.759 16
2 33 Max Verstappen RED BULL RACING TAG HEUER 1:15.756 1:15.640 1:14.785 15
3 44 Lewis Hamilton MERCEDES 1:15.673 1:15.644 1:14.894 20
4 5 Sebastian Vettel FERRARI 1:16.089 1:15.715 1:14.970 16
5 77 Valtteri Bottas MERCEDES 1:15.580 1:15.923 1:15.160 22
6 7 Kimi Räikkönen FERRARI 1:16.446 1:15.996 1:15.330 20
7 27 Nico Hulkenberg RENAULT 1:16.498 1:16.126 1:15.827 18
8 55 Carlos Sainz RENAULT 1:16.813 1:16.188 1:16.084 18
9 16 Charles Leclerc SAUBER FERRARI 1:16.862 1:16.320 1:16.189 20
10 9 Marcus Ericsson SAUBER FERRARI 1:16.701 1:16.633 1:16.513 20

Complete qualifying results available via Formula.com.

Tomorrow’s race airs live at 2:30PM Eastern on ABC in here in the States. With so much on the line and so much speed amongst the front runners, the dice among the top 6 on the opening lap should be epic. Hope to see you then to find out how it all shakes out!