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2024 Austrian Grand Prix Race Analysis

Austria was full of surprises in a few ways. Given the nature of this race the main focus is on the battle between Max and Lando in the final stint. I am covering their incidents in detail and examining which moves are legal and if any penalties were deserved.

The data this race lies more in the footage than the numbers. So that is what I will be examining in greater detail for this analysis.

Table of Contents Ferrari - Charles - Carlos Red Bull - Max - Max vs Lando Mclaren - Lando - Oscar Haas Mercedes - George Final Thoughts

Ferrari

Ferrari have been trying to optimize car setups for both drivers with the combination of both recent upgrades. This is a process and this race showed that they are getting closer to good qualifying again and the car still has the pace.

Charles

Charles made an error on his final qualifying lap and that cost him places on the grid. It was a risk to place higher in qualifying and it didn’t pay off. One thing to note is that Charles did believe the car had the speed for a top 3 placement and had he not made a mistake in that corner he probably would have been on the front two rows.

Charles’ race was determined in the opening lap. He made contact with Oscar when he was squeezed by Oscar and Checo. No penalties were given as this was lap one and there was crowding. I place blame on both Oscar and Checo, however Charles indicated that he believes Checo was more at fault because he forced him a little wide. He was behind so he shouldn’t have been there, 3 wide doesn’t work. So I will defer to Charles' opinion on the matter there.

The damage to Charles’ front wing required a long pit stop where he lost considerable places and put him 20 seconds off his original place. While they were able to swap the front wing there was also minor damage in a few places so the car was not perfect the rest of the race.

After this Charles’ race was entirely about trying to stay at a competitive pace to climb up places. He needed 4 pit stops, all on mediums to achieve this. And the team did great supporting him, keeping him on fresh enough rubber to be able to climb back up the field and have a chance at the points. The mediums were the best option, they weren’t lasting as long and since there was some damage Charles couldn’t preserve the tyres in the same way he normally does, but they were still offering better grip and speed compared to the hards this race.

Charles qualified P6 and finished P11. Not a good result, however considering the circumstance he still ran a good race, managing damage and a pretty narrow pit timing strategy.

Big thing to also note was Ferrari had an under 2 second pitstop for Charles, the fastest of the race, great work from the pit crew, that was the kind of speed Charles needed given how much time he was losing with needing to pit so often.

Carlos

Carlos qualified P4 and finished on the podium in P3. First Ferrari podium since Monaco and that is something to celebrate.

His race was pretty standard, he ran a clean race and the main focus was just to keep pace and not allow Oscar to pass too early or to fall behind him too much. And Carlos did that. He said himself he knew Oscar was going to pass eventually, that was almost inevitable given the difference in the cars this race, but he stayed pretty competitive on pace.

Carlos was faster on the first medium stint. Oscar was slightly faster on the hards. On the final medium stint Oscar was faster but Carlos was also on slightly older medium tyres, and Oscar still fell to his pace by the end, so Carlos tyre management was overall better, he just didn't have the car to properly fight on speed.

Carlos did show that the SF-24 pace is there, and that the car can still be expected to finish on the podium, even when the setup is not optimized.

Obviously this finish did benefit from Max and Lando being out of the top 3, but that’s the way this race worked. Lando and Max’s loss was Carlos’ gain. It’s good that he had the pace to stay near the front to be able to have the higher placement when that happened.

Good clean race from Carlos.

Overall a mixed result weekend from Ferrari. There were quite a few moments where the team was struggling, but both Charles and Carlos results from the car are promising and it seems that things are on an upward trajectory when it comes to optimizing the car setup for the upgrades.

Red Bull

Max

Max qualified on pole, and finished P5. His result was influenced by his main battle this race with Lando. The early stints of his race were not very eventful. Mostly because Max did build a pretty good gap to P2 on the first stint, and helped onto it in the second stint(although he was losing performance on the hards) It was the final stint that determined his race.

Max Vs Lando

The most important thing to note before diving into the actual battle between these two is the fact that Red Bull are the ones to blame for what unfolded. Max was well ahead of Lando, having created a good gap of about 6 to 7 seconds. Lando didn’t have the pace to catch him. The only reason Lando did catch Max was because Red Bull had a 6+ second pit stop which put Lando right on Max’s tail. That isn’t Max’s fault, his pace and speed were great, he should have been much farther ahead and there wouldn’t have been any battle. Red Bull failed Max here, and it cost them what likely would have been a win. This was the setup for Max actually having to defend against Lando.

The other thing about this pit was that Max had to take used mediums. Red Bull assumed this race would have two hard stints, and when the hard tyre was not performing well they had to fall back on their used mediums to try to keep the pace. Mclaren had two sets of mediums. So coming out of this pit Max was on used medium tyres and Lando was on new mediums. This also played a key role in their battle.

First a quick look at their full race pace.

The thing to note is Max being faster on that entire medium stint, that was when he created most of the gap to Lando. The hards both drivers struggled on, as did the rest of the field, the hard compound was not performing well on this track, and even then Max was faster more often than not, he was losing some time there but it was gradual enough to keep most of the gap he’d built. So Lando didn’t have the overall race pace to take Max this race, he needed that slow pit stop to be able to catch him, he was not going to close the gap otherwise.

Before we get into the footage and what happened I want to say that the TL:DR of my opinion on this battle was that it falls almost entirely under hard racing. There are a few moments that crossed the line but nothing egregious, and the results are more Lando's fault than Max's.

I also want to clear up some misconceptions about the rules. I have seen a lot of commentary and opinions about moves made by Max that don’t actually apply an understanding of the rules correctly.

Rules

First “No moving under braking” this is not actually against the rules. It was for a brief period between 2016 and 2017, but was deemed too restrictive to driver’s ability to defend their lines. So a looser rule Article L chapter IV 2.e was implemented.

“It is not permitted to drive any car unnecessarily slowly, erratically, or in a manner deemed potentially dangerous to other drivers at any time”

This article is up for a lot of interpretation, and yes moving under braking can fall under this rule. But it is vague on purpose to allow for discretion and specific interpretations of a situation. You can argue that that stewards should have issued a penalty under this rule. However, the idea that moving under braking is specifically outlined as always against the rules is incorrect, and thus Max is not automatically in violation of the rules for doing so.

This is assuming he did in fact move under braking. It seems in some cases he did, but it is such a narrow window it is hard to accurately see in the telemetry where on the track he started to brake. I say all of this to make clear that I am not saying that Max for sure moved under braking. Proving moving under braking is difficult, and if it is so unclear then the argument it was erratic or dangerous starts to fall apart.

Next I want to present the overtaking rules. Mainly that Max is allowed to move to defend his line going into a corner. The key thing is he is allowed to move ONCE in response to the car behind. And that is what he did. Lando's radios aired made it sound like those kinds of things are not allowed, but they are.

Max is allowed to move to defend his line. He is allowed to do so once in response to the car behind. Also Max did leave enough space for Lando in almost every interaction they had. The same cannot be said for Lando.

Finally this rule pertains to both Max and Lando's penalties. I would argue that Max did not repeat serious mistakes that caused a collision. Lando most certainly did leave the track multiple times without reason.

So, now you know what the rules are, and can see that they are not quite as narrow as some media outlets have suggested. There is a lot of room for interpretation, and that can present it's own problems. It's important to see what the rules actually say because they have been widely mis-reported on, especially by Mclaren.

With all that being said let’s look at the footage and what happened this battle.

Final Stint Battles

There has been a lot of criticism leveled at both drivers for their racing in this battle. I would say more of it has fallen on Max, likely because he was the one who was penalized for the contact. But to me it is pretty clear they are both equally responsible for how this unfolded, with more blame to be placed on Lando for his driving quality and dangerous moves.

Max was defending his line, he’s allowed to do this, and more importantly he was faster, getting to the apex first every time. Lando didn’t have the speed and to make up for this he divebombed. That is dangerous. Lando’s desperate driving naturally had Max defending more aggressively, if not things would have ended worse.

Lando was penalized for exceeding track limits for these moves. He wasn’t making clean pass attempts. He didn’t have the speed to actually get alongside Max for a better pass.

The first incident I want to look at is Lando’s overtake attempt that resulted in him overtaking off track and having to give the place back to Max.

Some have claimed this footage shows Max forcing Lando wide. Lando missed the apex by some margin, Max was turning because Lando should have turned as well, instead Lando is going straight for too long. Max narrowly avoided the collision there. The reason for this was that Lando was really late lining up that overtake, so he couldn’t pull it off cleanly. He needed to be alongside Max sooner for the overtake.

So here(frame 1 and 2), Lando is lunging to the inside, that’s fine. Max is on the outside and stays on the outside. Then going into the turn(frame 3) Lando goes straight and Max turns, he’s expecting Lando to turn, seeing as it’s a turn on the track that would be the thing to do there. Lando got there late and completely misjudged the apex. That’s why he locked up and went off the track. Max would have stayed on the outside there if Lando had set up the pass correctly. Max turned at roughly the right time. It only looks like he turns into Lando because Lando kept going straight.

Lando continued straight off the track, Max didn’t really change his line much except to avoid the crash, he had the outside line and he followed it, Lando went off the track himself and Max just turned.

Lando noted that Max was reacting to his move. This is allowed, under the sporting regulations a defending driver ahead is allowed to move once to react to an attack from an opponent. What isn’t allowed is multiple moves (weaving etc) Max was moving once.

The dangerous part was Lando attempting certain passes anyway after he saw how Max was defending.

But I think all of this from both Lando and Max falls under hard racing.

What was penalty worthy was the extent to which Lando was exceeding track limits. One time I can overlook but he did it continuously, and Max was not forcing him off. He was simply not lining up those overtake attempts well and leaving the track as a result. A deserved penalty on that front.

Furthermore on the quality of Lando's driving. He was revealing his hand on moves pretty early, and then was shocked when Max was easily able to react to the move and defend. That's a pretty simple skill issue. It's not like he was even making it hard for Max. He attempted the same move on the same corner multiple times in a row, it's no wonder Max didn't have trouble anticipating what he would do.

Lap 63

Lando lunged to the inside of Max on turn 4. That’s fine, he was going to try to overtake on the inside.

However again he went straight into the turn and dived into Max, which forced him off the track. He didn’t leave any space on the outside at all, so Max had to leave the track. Lando argued that he was at the apex first and thus Max had to give the place back, but that move wasn’t allowed, he forced his opponent off the track to ensure he reached the apex first. And then didn’t leave a space. The reason he got there first was because he went straight instead of turning. That’s the move Max was having a problem with.

So no, Max should not have given the position back.

Here the footage shows clearly where Lando cut Max off and forced him wide. This is probably penalty worthy according to the rules. The fact none was given while Max received a later penalty for less is interesting.

Lap 64

Now to the big incident, the lap 64 collision that resulted in Lando’s DNF and Max’s loss of the lead of the race (4 places in total)

Personally I would classify this as well under hard racing. I think that had they not been racing so hard up until this point and had Mclaren not complained so much about Max defending this wouldn’t have been a penalty(in addition to the fact it caused a DNF also probably played a role in the penalty). In my eyes both drivers are roughly equal in fault, and in those circumstances I usually say no one gets a penalty. It’s a pretty fine margin and a difference of opinion is likely in this area.

Here is a look at the key moments and car placement of the contact(indicated by green circle) It was pretty light contact. Max noted that it was surprising the amount of damage that was caused by the brief touch.

The thing in this footage is that Max does give Lando space. He didn't force him off. Lando expected Max to yield, and Max didn't and was under no obligation to, he gave Lando enough room (barely but it was enough) so he doesn't need to yield more space to him at this point.

I want to put this pass in context of the rest of the race. For multiple turns now Lando was diving to the inside and forcing Max wide. So now that Max is on the inside he’s just refusing the yield. It’s not surprising he would push back after laps of Lando making erratic pass attempts. I don’t think the way Max entered this corner is incorrect. It is slightly off the racing line, but I think it falls under hard racing.

However given he was on the inside line it seems that he was more at fault for the contact hence the penalty. I think the penalty also took into account previous moves that were noted.

Here is the rule that Max was penalized for breaking.

This clause is really up to the interpretation of the stewards, and they must have decided that Max’s driving in that turn was more at fault, likely because he was on the inside.

In my opinion I don’t think Max is clearly more at fault. I believe this incident is both driver’s fault in roughly equal measures. In this case I don’t believe either deserve a penalty, or both should be penalized. Max gave Lando space and there is large runoff in that corner. It was not dangerous and Max was not the sole party at fault for the contact.

This was hard racing. I believe that the stewards were very liberal in their interpretation here and given they overlooked other earlier incidents from Lando I don't think this penalty was entirely fair.

The second point of contact(when his rear tyre touched Lando's front wing) I don’t think is Max’s fault. He wasn’t in control of the car after the puncture and Lando turned into him. So the front wing damage Lando may have sustained is not Max’s fault.

I want to add that I believe Lando should have received an additional penalty for violating the same clause as Max. His dive bombing multiple times was erratic and dangerous, more so than anything Max was doing. If Max was deserving of a penalty for dangerous driving than so was Lando. Lando’s moves were worse because they were often in violation of track limits, which shows the moves were not legal.

Did Max force Lando into the grass after the collision between the two on the turn?

No.

Watch the footage. Lando is very clearly behind Max leaving the turn. Both have damage. The important thing here is that Max was ahead and had the racing line. Lando speeds up and pushes hard to get alongside Max. Who at that point was under no obligation to give him space. Lando defeated himself there and further damaged his own car by trying to catch up to Max. What was he trying to accomplish? He wasn’t going to get past Max at that point? Max can’t prevent Lando from making rash moves.

Max already made his line clear when coming out of the corner, and it doesn’t change in reaction to Lando. Lando was the one who cut across the track to try to shoot for that gap. A gap it was clear Max was going to close regardless of if Lando was there.

The reason Max was driving like this and on that line had nothing to do with Lando at this point. Max had a puncture, you can see the tyre moving and wobbling. He’s trying to move with it so that it stays on the wheel long enough for him to make it back to the pits. If he drifted in the other direction he would make the problem worse and risk the tyre slipping off. He’s basically chasing the direction the tyre needs to be able to make it back to the pits. You can see him moving to try to center the tyre better after the contact. If he had moved over he would have slid the tyre off the axle and sustained more damage that probably would have ended his race.

You can see above that the tyre is slightly toward the body of the car. If Max had drifted more to the outside of the track he would have pushed the tyre off the wheel and then he would have ended his race. He needed to follow the tyre's movement to keep it on so he could make it back to the pits, this required him to make a clean diagonal across the track which he did not deviate from.

Lando on the other hand didn’t try to manage his puncture. He was behind Max and the line Max was on was very clear. Max didn’t change direction. So Lando diving(Frame 3 where he suddenly changed direction) to the outside and speeding up there was entirely his fault. He had no business being there, it didn’t accomplish anything because he already had the damage. In fact he made his own damage worse with that stunt. He could have done what Max did and try to get back to the pits to be able to finish the race. But he didn’t. People make it seem like Max pushed Lando off, that wasn’t what he was doing at all. Lando swerved to the outside of Max there and shouldn’t be shocked when Max, who was nursing damage, didn't yield.

Given the circumstance and Max’s consistent movement here the rules also side with Max.

The rules outline the need for DELIBERATE crowding of a car. It is quite clear in the footage that Max didn’t change anything when Lando approached, and he didn’t deliberately crowd him off. This is why no penalty was given.

So no, Max didn’t push Lando off, Max was dealing with his tyre in the only way he could. Lando created that problem for himself. And the result was he damaged his car more so he wasn’t able to recover at the pits. If he had kept behind Max and actually tried to manage the puncture he had a chance of staying in the race. But he chose not to, and guaranteed an end to his own race. Not trying to negate the actual fault in the contact into the turn. However, it wasn’t a guaranteed DNF coming out of it. One driver managed things to be able to finish the race, the other didn’t.

But the key thing to take away from this part of the race is to watch the tyre and see that’s what Max is reacting to, not Lando. The grass incident was of Lando’s own making.

Max didn’t make Lando speed up like that to try to pass him again. He also didn’t make Lando choose that line. Lando has no one to blame but himself for that part of the incident.

Ultimately my opinion is that the way Lando was lunging into the corner was more dangerous than any move Max pulled against him. You could tell from watching who was the more experienced and skilled driver at wheel to wheel driving.

What I have found shocking is the way this battle is being reported on. The bias in the media is strong this week, and I would encourage everyone to watch the footage with the actual rules in mind to see who moved and who gave space and when, because the footage paints a very different story when you take the actual rules into account, not the rules the Mclaren have been implying exist when they don't.

Max showed his usual wheel to wheel battling skills, and also managed to keep his car on the track even after the puncture. Superior driving from him compared to Lando.

Some have been upset that Max's ten second time penalty did not result in him losing places. He finished the race in P5 and after the 10 seconds were applied he was still in P5.

Well that's not his fault the car behind was so far behind his time. Ten seconds is the fair penalty time for this. The fact Lando DNFed does not change what the punishment should be. Max was just fast enough to be able to out race a penalty, which does happen.

Max reminded us all this race why he is the current champion.

Mclaren

Lando

I have said numerous times in previous race analyses that I did not believe Lando could pass Max in competitive conditions. And this race proved me right.

I am not saying Max was perfect, however Lando’s driving was erratic, desperate, and was never going to work. He tried to make the same pass and acted surprised when Max was able to anticipate the same move at the same corner. He wasn’t even able to actually make the pass because he needed to go over track limits every time. And he didn’t have the pace to get alongside Max for the pass.

This was very sloppy driving at the front on his part. Examining the passes it was clear he didn’t have the pace going into the turn to make the pass cleanly. Pushing and not estimating that correctly was what cost him.

Also it is important to note that Lando was on fresh medium tyres and Max was not and Lando still was not able to properly close the gap. There was a pace difference between the two due to the tyre age and Lando still was not able to properly overtake Max. That’s another issue of skill.

He had DRS, fresher tyres and still wasn’t able to get past Max. And yes the leader is allowed to fight being passed, that’s part of racing. What I am saying is that these factors should have been enough for Lando to make a clean pass. None of his pass attempts were good. He exceeded track limits multiple times trying to do so.

I think this comes down to Lando’s inexperience with actually fighting on track at the front. I said before this would be a problem for him and I was right. A lot of what we saw in this battle was Lando’s inability to figure out how to fight Max coming to light.

Really sloppy race from Lando and he ultimately defeated himself. He had a chance to try to make it back to the pits without race ending damage, but he didn't he pushed the car and ruined the rest of his own race.

Mclaren also arguably should have been penalized for Lando driving with unsafe damage. We saw that he was losing pieces of carbon fiber and brake duct pieces and other debris was being strewn across the track. Checo and Red Bull were penalized for something very similar in Canada and yet this time there was no penalty given.

Oscar

Oscar qualified P7 and finished P2. He would have been higher on the starting grid but his Q3 lap time was deleted for track limits and then Mclaren failed to properly appeal the decision. His best Q3 time would have seen him start P3.

He ran a solid race, climbing up the field pretty quickly. He finished in P2. He like the other top 3 benefited from the race leaders losing places, but again, that's the way this race worked. He did a good job climbing up all those places.

Solid racing from him and a solid result.

Haas

This was Haas best race result not just this year, but in years period. Nico finished P6 and Kevin finished P8. They brought home a combined total of 12 points in this one race. In 2023 Haas scored 12 points in an entire year. So in a single race Haas took home their WCC total from last year. That's a pretty big deal for a mid-field team. This race really showed just how far the team has come in such a short time.

Not only that but both drivers drove really well. At the beginning we saw them battle, feeling out each other's pace. It became clear that Nico was the faster and after that they were on a mission to secure those points.

Nico especially had the best race in Austria. He was one of the few drivers really making the hard tyres work for him. He overtook Checo in a Red Bull, and was even able to use his tyres to really mess around with him a bit on track. I will note that when he overtook he was on newer hard tyres. But still his management and use of them was yielding far more than the Red Bull. It was genuinely impressive racing from a racecraft standpoint on multiple fronts. I

Haas as a team had the best race in Austria, and both drivers had the best races of their season thus far.

Mercedes

This was Mercedes best result of the season. George qualified P3 and finished P1, Lewis qualified P5 and finished P4.

George

George won the second Grand Prix of his career and it certainly was a unique win.

Because this wasn’t a win of speed or sheer racecraft. It was taking advantage of an opportunity and driving the cleanest race at the front.

The interesting thing is George himself said in his pre-race interviews that for him to have a clear shot at the win (given the speed of the two cars ahead) something would have to happen to Max and also Lando. And when miraculously something did happen to the lead two drivers George was there to capitalize. He said the circumstances that they would need for a win on his side, and when the circumstances presented themselves he was there to be able to take home the win.

Just shows that sometimes running the cleanest race with the fewest mistakes is what will pay off. George was fast, he wasn’t the fastest. But given the way this race unfolded this wasn’t going to be a win of pure speed.

Here you can see that George was by no means the fastest, however his management on the hards, which was more challenging this race, and simple consistency put him in his position.

George and Lewis were pretty evenly matched on pace. George was faster that first medium stint. Lewis made his hards last much longer. They were on a different tyre strategy by the end of the race so a comparison there is harder.

Good job George!

Final Thoughts

I have been really disappointed with how the main battle of this race has been reported on. British bias has always been a problem in the sport but this week it really came out in full force. I encourage everyone to read the actual rules and watch the footage for car movement yourself. When someone is telling you what is happening that can be misleading. Don't just listen to me either. I have presented my opinion, you can take it or leave it.

Interesting race from a footage perspective. I am optimistic about Ferrari going into the next few rounds. We'll see if I am proven right on that front soon enough.

That's all I got, see you all in Silverstone!

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