There are quite a few things that perhaps one didn’t expect this season from a driver only for them to happen for real. For instance, no one saw Daniel Ricciardo’s inglorious exit from the sport to happen in the manner the Australian was subjected to.
Just how many of us imagined Lando Norris to come up so close to Max Verstappen as to give the Dutchman a near death knell on the drivers’ charts with just a handful of races remaining?
One expected brilliance from Oscar Piastri but not of the kinds that would show the mirror to a much more experienced lad in Charles Leclerc and that too, at a track like Baku?
And while Red Bull’s Sergio Perez’s decline was perhaps a touch expected, what wasn’t was the manner in which Carlos Sainz would fight back in these closing stages of the 2024 championship having gone downhill post Austria. Surely, none expected a driver who had gotten his appendix removed to win his very next Formula 1 Grand Prix, Sainz doing magical things at Melbourne Park but his latest feat at Mexico City is, arguably speaking, just as dazzling.
Is it not? In going blazingly fast at 1:15:946 in the final push lap of Q3 for the Mexican Grand Prix qualifying, not only did Carlos Sainz emerge the fastest on the grid, he also clinched his first pole of the year. Once again, who’d have thought that with just five races to go on the calendar, the Madrid-born would pick his first pole of the season? It came in late for the man from Spain, but it spared him the pain he’d endured on previous occasions where despite the car being in fine shape and ditto for his form, Sainz wasn’t able to break through.
Not on that occasion as the final moments of the Mexico City track unfurled massacring speed of the SF-24, whereby Carlos Sainz emerged over two tenths out on the front of Verstappen. Next to follow the Dutchman was Lando Norris, the Red Bull’s main source of pain especially in the second half of the season.
The trinity would be pursued by Charles Leclerc of Ferrari; the Monegasque in the other Scuderia machine finding himself quite adrift of his speedy teammate.
Source– Scuderia Ferrari Instagram
George Russell and Lewis Hamilton lined up behind the pack in that order. But while Russell would remember to evade on race-day the kind of crash he had endured on a dramatic Saturday, which, in turn, prompted the session to a red flag halt, Carlos Sainz, on the other hand, would be careful for some other reason altogether. He’d be aware that right behind him are two drivers who’d perhaps go at everything in their battle to outrun each other.
This, interestingly, can play out differently. Even as it all seems conjecture at this point, Carlos Sainz could either act defensive and watchful and try not to do something drastic right at the start in order to fire away at his pursuant or it could well be that while Norris pushes Verstappen to get his nose out in front in second, Sainz gets the opportunity to maximise his lead out in the front and chip away.
But again, all of this is mere conjecturing. Who knows what might the changing tide of F1 bring? Can Sainz even retain the lead of rhe race lead that he’s clung onto so bravely at this time or will Leclerc do a better job at the start? Regardless; it’s all to play for. The man currently stacked in fifth on the Drivers’s standings would want to be second to none come the race. Isn’t it? After all, just who would have an issue with another dominant Ferrari podium?