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Mercedes driver
Valtteri Bottas won his second race of the season with a one-stop strategy
at the Red Bull Ring, having started from pole on the ultrasoft and then
switching to the supersoft.
A number of different one-stop strategies were tried, with all three
nominated compounds (soft, supersoft and ultrasoft) seen on the starting
grid. In particular, Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton started from P8 due to a
grid penalty and moved from the supersoft to the ultrasoft to make up four
places by the end of the race. Both Felipe Massa, driving for Williams, and
Renault’s Jolyon Palmer adopted an alternative strategy by starting on soft
and going onto ultrasoft, to also make up a few places from their grid
positions.
With a short lap featuring very few corners and none of the expected rain,
the fastest average lap speeds of the entire season so far were seen in
Austria this weekend. This was one of the factors that led to some visible
blistering in some moments of the race; however, this did not impact on
performance as it was seen by their lap times.
MARIO ISOLA - HEAD OF CAR RACING
“With some very fast average speeds and no rain, there was a bit of
blistering but this did not affect performance – with the fastest laps being
set at the end of the race. Although one stop was the standard choice, there
were many different variations on the one-stop strategy, with a few drivers
trying something different to make up places. On the whole, the strategy
options were quite aggressive throughout the field, with some long runs even
on the ultrasoft. This underlines the confidence that the teams have both in
the speed and durability of the tyre range.”
TRUTHOMETER
Valtteri Bottas won the race using one pit stop, going from ultrasoft to
supersoft on lap 42. The theoretically fastest strategy was adopted by Lewis
Hamilton, who started on supersoft then moved to ultrasoft. |
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