Formula One Vault

PRIXVIEW – Saudi Arabian Grand Prix

Round two of the 2023 season brings F1 to the high-speed and twisty circuit in the Red Sea resort of Jeddah for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. The 3.836-mile circuit is one of the new breeds of street circuits with long high-speed sections and overtaking opportunities.

Jeddah has the most corners on the current calendar at 3.836mi is one of the longest circuits of the season. The fourth night race in a row, second of 2022, should provide plenty of drama as the drivers thread their way through the barriers trying not to make mistakes on track. This increases the chances of overtaking and action.

Jeddah can be described as a cross between Baku and Monaco, you need the speed of Baku and the accuracy of Monaco through the corners. Get it wrong when pushing as Mick Schumacher proved last year during qualifying you will crash into the wall but overtaking is possible.

This means getting it right in qualifying is an advantage, but isn’t as crucial to having a good session as in Monaco. It’s a circuit of high risk and high reward, drivers at any street circuit safety cars and accidents mean this is a race where reaching to events on track could be key in getting results in Jeddah, across the field.

The Jeddah Corniche Circuit located on the Red Sea coast is the second-longest circuit on the calendar and has Average speeds around the Jeddah Corniche Circuit are around 250kph (155mi), quicker than those at Silverstone, and second on the 2021 calendar only to Monza, ‘The Temple of Speed’. It is, quite simply, the fastest street circuit ever seen.

Jeddah is another night race, like its neighbours in Abu Dhabi, Doha and Sakhir, the last one for the teams until Singapore, this again makes it very important to not overreact if things aren’t going right in the late afternoon session as the sunsets. It gives teams the opportunity in similar conditions to Bahrain to learn and improve in these conditions for Singapore, Lusail, Las Vegas and Abu Dhabi.

Although the time of FP1 & FP3 will also be useful as the time is similar to all other qualifying sessions, its going to be another weekend where the teams don’t need to overreact if they are off the pace in the daytime sessions. Red Bull will come into this weekend as the team to beat given how Max Verstappen

The circuit runs past large recreation areas, pavilions, and large-scale civic sculptures as well as King Fahd’s Fountain, the highest fountain in the world. The circuit has twenty-three corners and was designed by Carsten Tilke the son of Hermann, who has designed many of the circuits we have seen in the last two decades.

Jeddah is a more flowing circuit and should in theory favour the top speed advantage enjoyed by the SF-23, a factor that enabled Max Verstappen to win in 2022 when the car characteristics were seemingly reversed.

Additionally, three consecutive sections of the circuit which are DRS Zones adding to the opportunities to overtake. There was a determination by the designer not to create these ‘micky mouse’ street circuits, and in the two races we have seen in Jeddah, there have been accidents, drama and overtaking on track. The regulation changes last season did create more overtaking opportunities on track.

There were a number of close midfield battles as well including a hard-fought battle between Alpine’s Fernando Alonso and Esteban Ocon for quite a few laps where they swapped positions multiple times. But in both races, Verstappen’s tactics have been criticised given his aggressive acceleration and braking techniques, but it was deemed legal, despite the controversies at the end of 2021.

There has been concerns about the safety of the circuit following crashes during qualifying with Nicolas Latifi and Schumacher last year as well as security concerns after an Aramco oil depot near Jeddah was attacked by drones and missiles, triggering a large fire.

This triggered the first serious possibility of the first drivers’ strike in forty years, as the drivers were locked into all-night negotiations with the FIA, F1 and the government before being reassured over security and convinced to race after being warned of “the consequences of not racing.”

There are of course other controversies around this race, human, woman and LGBT rights, but the Saudi government are trying “to make our society more inclusive and diverse and to promote equality.” Accusations of double standards over the Russian invasion of Ukraine given Saudi Arabia’s involvement in the war in Yemen.

The circuit was originally intended to be the race’s temporary home until 2026 while a permanent circuit is built in Qiddiya. However, Saudi Arabia’s minister for sport HRH Abdulaziz Bin Turki Al-Faisal has expressed some interest in keeping Jeddah as well as hosting two races or alternating annually.

Race & Circuit Guide

Fast facts

• Jeddah Street Circuit was the 75th different venue to join the Formula 1 calendar.
• With the previous race marking F1’s first visit to Qatar, the 2021 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix was the first time that the sport visited two new countries in succession since the inaugural season in 1950.
• Formula 1’s links to Saudi Arabia go all the way back to the 1970s, when the Saudia national airline sponsored the Williams team.
• The hairpin at Turn 13 of Jeddah Corniche Circuit features twelve degrees of banking. It’s seven degrees less steep than the banking at Zandvoort.
• Saudi Arabia has a total land area of 2,150,000 km2, but there are no rivers in the country! It is the largest country in the world without a river.

Event timetable

What happened in 2022?

Sergio Perez took his maiden pole position, beating Charles Leclerc by two-hundredths of a second. That meant the Mexican set a new record for most races started without starting from pole position, after piping the Ferrari driver to deny the team a second consecutive front-row lockout.

Leclerc pushed his teammate Carlos Sainz off pole out qualifying the Spaniard by a tenth, but Perez’s teammate Max Verstappen couldn’t improve on his final run. The session had been suspended for almost an hour when Mick Schumacher had a huge crash in the second part of the session.

However the session was defined by a big crash for Mick Schumacher, the Haas driver lost control at turn twelve hitting g the wall on both sides and ripping a tyre off which hit the halo. Haas confirmed the German driver was ok, but Schumacher has been transferred to King Fahad Armed Forces Hospital, for “precautionary checks”.

Max Verstappen went onto take his first victory of a season after lunging past Leclerc on lap forty six. The two title rivals had battle “to the limit” through out the race before the Red Bull driver found a way past the Ferrari.

The battle was almost farcical at stages as both drivers tried to stop and break the DRS advantage, it saw them trading each other off. Leclerc had planned to run longer into the race with the belief of extra pace, which was turned on the head when Nicolas Latifi crashed bringing out the safety car on lap seventeen.

Leclerc’s teammate Carlos Sainz couldn’t join the battle at the front as the leaders played chicken in the final ten laps, the Spaniard finishing the race eight seconds behind Verstappen. Verstappen’s teammate Sergio Perez lead early on after converting his maiden pole into the lead before losing out with the timing of the safety car.

Race Result – 1) M. Verstappen, Red Bull, 01:24:19.293 | 2) C. Leclerc, Ferrari, +00:00.549 | 3) C. Sainz, Ferrari, +00:08.097

What to watch for?

Max Verstappen believes this race will be closer this is a very different circuit to Sakhir, this is a very different circuit because of the high tyre wear and fast-flowing sections. But given the dominance we saw during the race in Sakhir can they be beaten, Ferrari looked not to be able to go to that next level.

RB19 excelled in Bahrain partly due to its superior acceleration out of low- and medium-speed corners, while Red Bull fared far better than Ferrari when it came to managing tyres on the particularly abrasive asphalt. It’s a really strong evolution from 2022, but Ferrari can fight back given the fact we are at a street circuit where there are opportunities to take advantage when there are safety cars, yellow flags etc.

But Ferrari need to find answers to Red Bull’s pace given they were forty eight second behind in fourth as well as reliability after Charles Leclerc’s retirement in Bahrain. Though we only have had one race as we saw last season once you get some momentum, as well as having a car behind you it’s very difficult to come back. However, since 2014, the winner of the opening race hasn’t gone onto win the championship.

Mercedes have made progress but with Red Bull making another step forwards you could say its almost stabilised at the same level as it was at the end of 2022. But from listening and reading what they are saying, it sounds as they are not in as bad as it was this time last year, but they along with Ferrari have to start fighting back now if they are to stop Red Bull taking the title.

Being a street circuit, we know that track evolution is rapid throughout practice and qualifying the circuit will evolve quite quickly meaning that being on track at the right time can be very important. However, teams will also need to be careful as they could overreact if they are off the pace in the warmer late afternoon sessions, its still about learning.

The interesting thing this weekend will be figuring out how the cars perform at a high-speed street circuit, this isn’t Monaco, but we know with several street circuits until June excluding Imola and Barcelona getting this weekend right could be key for the early part of the season.

Aston Martin is the midfield leaders, the feeling is they are genuinely the fourth fastest team and have made the biggest step over the winter it will be interesting to see how they deploy resources if they continue in that success into the season. Alpine are likely to be their nearest challengers, while McLaren need to find a way out of the current difficulties they had in Bahrain.

2021 vs 2022 Race Data

2022 Lap time comparison

Tyres