Yuge race last weekend. And what more can we say about Belgium that we haven’t already said? Great track, better country, amazing people, food that you read about. Just a great race to come back to after the long summer break. I am sure you all know the results, but let me hit you with them right quick just as a reminder. Lewis won the race, Vettel came in second, Daniel Ricciardo came in the third. I subscribe to the belief that if you aren’t first, you are last. But in F1 you get points for 2nd-10th place as well, who knew?Lewis really dominated the race. He was on the pole (that is the term for starting the race in first place, could use some work if you ask me) and lost it only briefly. Sebastian Vettel tried to get his Ferrari up to speed and ahead of Lewis, but just could not hang on to first place. Lewis had one of the nicest passes I have ever seen on Vettel last weekend. So these two had a nice little scrap during the race, with Lewis landing a few more body shots than Vettel.
What about the Merc and Ferrari teammates? Well they were taken care of by the Australian stud muffin Daniel Ricciardo. Danny Ric put Kimi and Valteri in his back pocket. He made easy work of those two Fins, passing them both and holding onto that position for the remainder of the race. Ric’s teammate, Max Verstappen, was not as fortunate this race, retiring very early on and needing to count to 10 to calm down.
As for everyone’s favorite old timer, Fernando Alonso had a miserable race. Did not finish, obviously, but the larger story was the nature of his retirement. After Fernando asked if there was any race in the forecast, and finding out there was none, he found an issue with the car and parked it. Parking a healthy car in the paddock is frowned upon in F1. I am sure the big bad boys of F1, Lewis and Vettel, will give Fernando a stern talking to. And then they will go get him breakfast and a coffee. I fear that someday ESPN will release a 30 for 30 titled “The Greatest Driver that never was – the Fernando Alonso Story”. On to Italy.