When the lights went out the headline was an awful start by Antonelli who went from second to seventh. Ferrari went well: LeClerc was third and Hamilton went from second out of the first corner to leading by the middle of the lap and then LeClerc got through for second. Verstappen hit someone on the first lap, possibly, it was hard to tell and the replays didn't come for quite some time, and his stable mate Linblad spun right around in the middle of the pack. The new energy system saw Russell get the lead back by the end of the first lap and then Hamilton retook it. The racing was fast and furious. Do we mind that the racing is due to use of amped up battery power?
Further back, Albon had made it up to 16th by the end of the second lap from the pit lane and was behind his team mate.
It went back and forth between the two former team mates until LeClerc had caught up to them on lap six and was in the mix too. Unusually, we had no radio transmissions broadcast.
Having got up to fifth place, Antonelli got a ten second penalty for crashing into Hadjar. I wonder if the length of penalties should be decreased given the lesser number of laps in a Sprint?
The Ferraris were battling now, with LeClerc getting past Hamilton, all of which played into Russell's hands, who was currently in the lead. On Lap 11, Antonelli was close enough and with enough battery to get past Hamilton for third. At this point, it started going wrong for everyone: Linblad then Bottas were asked to go into the pit lane to retire their cars and Hulkenberg had to pull over to stop. A Safety Car came out and the top five all came in for fresh tyres followed on the next lap by drivers from up and down the pit lane. With only five laps to go, it seemed like madness and the last sprint of the Sprint would be full on. Several drivers lost out as they were double-stacked.
It was several laps until the Safety Car did come in, with three laps to go and it would have been amusing but disappointing if the race had finished under it with all the tyre changes. The drivers were weaving their cars frantically to boost the tyre temperature. LeClerc lost out with wheel spin. The rolling start, rather than a standing start, evened out the playing friend. Hamilton was able to get past Norris for the final podium place. Perez received a five second time penalty for a Safety Car infringement. Piastri was told to give a place back to Antonelli back as he was under investigation for overtaking him before the Green "go racing" flag.
Russell won and was lucky that the Ferraris fought with each other and let him take it more easily. Behind him in the points was LeClerc, Hamilton, Norris, Antonelli, Piastri, Lawson and Bearman. Verstappen was right outside the points.
I could see that the main race would probably have a first stint similar to this and then it will settle down. The only differential could be whether there are Safety Cars.
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