What’s Alfa Romeo’s Take On The 2021 Belgian GP?

How might have Alfa Romeo felt about the Belgian GP swallowed by the rains?

Alfa Romeo’s last point this year, where we already have had twelve races so far, was at the Hungarian GP, where Kimi Raikkonen managed to take a solitary point, but that was also at the back of the last minute disqualification handed to Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel.

Prior to that, Kimi was able to score a point at Baku, once again, at the back of an accident-marred Baku GP where Verstappen’s crash and then, Hamilton’s brakes overheating prompted a completely different result out in the end.

Alfa Romeo have been having a tough time!

So far, Antonio Giovinazzi has only been able to score a point at Monaco, home to the famous principality, even as he’s repeatedly outpaced Kimi, his idol, in the qualifying battles.

All of this collectively meant that something had to happen and in the positive for the Swiss-Italian team, headquartered at Hinwill where the just-concluded Spa-bound Belgian GP was concerned. Though at the end of it all, what transpired were heartbreaks, not just for the likes of McLaren’s Norris, Red Bull’s Perez or Alpine’s Alonso but for both Alfa Romeo drivers.

A race that was handicapped severely by incessant rains, seeing no more than two laps in the end, and that too, behind the safety car meant that the Spa-bound action was hurt majorly by inclement weather.

There weren’t any real winners so to speak in any sense of the word. Not the drivers, even those who finished until tenth (P10) for only half their respective position’s points were awarded in the end. Furthermore, not the teams, who endured a tough and disappointing race, and definitely, not the fans either- who saw precious money going down the drains, literally speaking.

Alfa Romeo, in the end of it all, made no bones whatsoever about another lowly outing. And it was lowly since the team saw both drivers finishing outside of points, for the fifth time, following Baku up to the start of the Hungarian GP, the precursor to Spa.

That’s a kind of performance that can only be dubbed terrible and not merely for individual drivers, but a collective standpoint of the team.

What did Alfa Romeo team principal say on Spa’s lack of contest?

The Fred Vassuer-led team had the following bits to share about a contest none found any fun in:

“The decision not to race in these conditions was the right one, in the interest of protecting the safety of the drivers, the marshals, and the spectators themselves. However, the situation would have been dealt with a lot more appropriately by not having at all the ‘race’ we witnessed yesterday: this outcome hurts us all, but in particular it hurts fans of the sport, who didn’t get the show they came to see. We hope lessons were learnt yesterday, lessons that will improve the way we operate in the future and that put the supporters of our sport in the position they deserve to be,” concluded the team.

The next Grand Prix being in Zandvoort, where none of the drivers on the current F1 grid have previously raced is bound to increase the pressure on a team that since 2019, where it was a midfielder, has gone on to become the backmarker. Who knows what might happen this coming weekend?