Aston Martin Cognizant F1 Team Styrian and Austrian Grands Prix preview

Sebastian Vettel: “The goal is to continue our points-scoring form in Austria and maintain our consistency. It’s a great circuit to race at because it’s such a quick lap but with plenty of high-speed and difficult corners.

It feels great when you can hook the car up for a lap. It is always challenging to race at the same circuit back-to-back because the margins become increasingly small the more laps we do, but that makes it exciting.”

Lance Stroll   “Overall, Paul Ricard was a positive weekend for the team. The car showed great race pace, which enabled me to bounce back from a tough qualifying session. We head to Austria with strong momentum and we’re hungry for more.”

Cognizant’s Keys to the Race

•    With three DRS zones (Turns One to Three, Turns Three to Four and Turns 10 to One), there’s plenty of overtaking opportunities around a lap of the circuit. In 2020, the first Austrian race had 29 passes after the first lap, before an upswing to 43 the following weekend. A total of 76% of those overtakes were assisted by DRS, underlining its powerful impact.
 

•    Overtaking is comparable to Baku. The best opportunities to overtake in Austria come at Turns Three and Four due to the heavy braking point on entry into Turn Three, which can reward late-brakers and offers several angles of attack. With a DRS zone immediately following, the downhill run to Turn Four offers a chance to fight back or power past for position.
 

•    Pirelli is splitting its tyre options in Austria. The opening race will use the C2, C3 and C4 mid-range, used last time out in France, before going one step softer for the Austria finale with the C3, C4 and C5. The venue is traditionally low on degradation, so expect a one-stopper to be the standard strategy.
 

•    In 2020, there were four Safety Cars across the two races in Austria (three in the opening and one in the second event), but historically there is a 50% chance of a Safety Car in dry Austrian races, and there has only ever been one Virtual Safety Car, back in 2018. A mid-race interruption could potentially turn the race into a two-stopper.

Timetable

Session    BST    Local time
Free Practice One    10:30 – 11:30    11:30 – 12:30
Free Practice Two    14:00 – 15:00    15:00 – 16:00
Free Practice Three    11:00 – 12:00    12:00 – 13:00
Qualifying    14:00 – 15:00    15:00 – 16:00
Grand Prix    14:00 – 16:00    15:00 – 17:00

Matt Bishop- photos AMR

 
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