New owners, new style …

Liberty Media scored a PR coup in working with Ferrari and finding the distraught six-year-old who had been in tears after Kimi Raikkonen’s early exit from the race. Thomas Danel from Amiens in France was brought to the motorhome to meet his hero Raikkonen and there were smiles all round. His mother, Coralie Danel, was hugely impressed:“This has been the most fantastic day for us. We could not believe it when they came to get us and took us to Ferrari,” she said. “This is great for fans like us, it really makes F1 and all of its people come alive. Brilliant.”

It is significant in that it is something that would almost certainly not have happened during the Bernie Ecclestone era but Liberty are aware of the importance of social media and the child’s meeting with Raikkonen created massive interest. They have also committed to improving the fans’ experience and took various initiatives at the race to promote what they described as a “fan festival”. It is straightforward stuff, of course, but these are areas that the previous owners ignored for profit reasons while Liberty are starting to make good on some of their initial promises.

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… And yet: new owners, same old story

On the other side of the coin, Liberty made it clear that feelgood moments for fans are not going to interfere with their pursuit of the bottom line. F1’s chief executive, Chase Carey, was in Spain and he met with John Grant, the chairman of the British Racing Drivers’ Club who own Silverstone, who this year had expressed fears the circuit would have to stop hosting the British Grand Prix due to it becoming financially unsustainable. Their contract, which began at £12m in 2010, is set to rise to £26m by 2027.

The BRDC had warned it could trigger a break clause to opt out of the contract after the 2019 race but had been buoyed by the initial responses of the new owners and were optimistic that there would be some form of renegotiation. Carey was having none of it in Barcelona. “We will not be renegotiating the contract,” he said. “We value Silverstone and we want the race to be a success and will work with them to help achieve that, but we won’t be redoing agreements that were previously concluded in good faith between two parties. Silverstone made money last year.”

This is a key point in how the new owners are going to run the business. Silverstone cannot sell any more tickets, it is as successful a weekend as F1 has in numbers and it is very hard to see what could be done for it to make more money to cover the increasing costs. Liberty talk of putting on rock concerts and the like to attract more fans but Silverstone simply does not need that – it has the fans but it needs a break financially. It is one area where Liberty seem decidedly to be still using the old F1 model.

Alonso finally makes the finish

Some reason for cautious optimism at McLaren after a weekend that started disastrously with Fernando Alonso’s engine giving out in the first lap of first practice. They recovered enough for him to put in a magnificent lap to take seventh place on the grid – higher than the car deserved and a reminder of Alonso’s value to the team. Then he finished the race, albeit in 12th and two laps down, but it is the first time he has done so this season. Furthermore he was very positive in how the chassis felt with some decent running. “There is still work to do to be at the level of Mercedes and Ferrari,” he said. “They are definitely ahead of everyone but we could be right behind them in terms of the chassis.”

After the race, the team principal, Eric Boullier, agreed: “It’s clear that the MCL32 is a chassis that our drivers can really lean on.” All good then, but the main problem remains, that they are at least 50bhp down on the leaders. And the news from Spain is that it is not coming soon. Honda’s Yusuke Hasegawa cast doubt over whether they would be ready to bring their new engine to Canada as had been planned.

Certainly Alonso was not expecting much in the short term. He reiterated that he had “zero regrets” about missing the Monaco Grand Prix. “I will race the Indy 500, one of the biggest races in the world,” he said. “There are six cars, two Mercedes, two Ferraris, two Red Bulls that will be unbeatable for the next couple of races so to fight for P7 in Monaco? No thanks.”

Force India goes from strength to strength

Having already enjoyed a remarkable start to the season, with both their drivers scoring points in every race, Spain yielded Force India’s most impressive results yet. All of which has been heavily against the odds. Their car is not performing as well as they had hoped after fourth place last season. They have correlation problems with data from the Toyota wind tunnel they use in Cologne and have an issue with rear instability that has yet to be solved. But they keep scoring points and in Spain it was not down to a raft of upgrades.

They did bring a new floor, designed to solve the aero stall that is affecting performance but were largely experimenting with a combination of older and new parts rather than sweeping changes. Sergio Pérez said before the race: “In pure pace, we shouldn’t be there. We’ve been doing big miracles to be where we are”. And he and Esteban Ocon promptly performed another to claim fourth and fifth at the Circuit de Catalunya. Reinforcing their fourth place in the constructors’ championship, just 19 points back from Red Bull. The deputy team principal, Bob Fearnley, rightly praised the team’s consistency as their greatest strength but if they get the car working too, Vijay Mallya’s pre-season goal of his team finishing in the top three might not be quite the pipe dream it seemed.

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Sauber make a score

Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel’s fascinating battle for the win caught all the attention but one of the drives and team performances of the day were by Pascal Wehrlein and Sauber. The German finished eighth, scoring the team’s first points of the season and leaving McLaren ignominiously as the only ones yet to claim a point. Like Force India, they were punching well above their weight.

The 22-year-old missed the first two races due to a back injury, creating a lot of criticism and speculation, but now he is back in the car he is proving why he is so highly rated. He drove an exemplary race taking just one stop for the best result of his career in F1. Sauber also did not have the car they expected when the season began and the team principal, Monisha Kaltenborn, recognised that to do well they needed something special. “A great result for our team – with a perfect strategy behind it. Both drivers have put in a good performance,” she said.

The decisions in question are being made by their British race strategist Ruth Buscombe, who previously worked at Ferrari and Haas and has repeatedly proved that with her astute skills in getting the maximum from a race situation, she is invaluable to the team.