Reliability scare is rivals' only hope as Perez leads Red Bull 1-2 in 2023 Saudi Arabian GP: race report

Alonso was also able to take advantage, as he could take his time penalty when the rest of the field was circulating more slowly. The rear jack was in contact with the car but race control – supporting by the FIA’s remote operations centre in Geneva – was happy that no work was done within the five-second window.

On the restart, Perez pulled away comfortably, and Alonso managed to edge away from Russell again too. Verstappen took just five laps to move up to second place by the halfway stage – using DRS to his advantage on both occasions – while Hamilton cleared the one car he had lost a place to during the pitstops as he pulled a smart switchback on Sainz to regain fifth.

At this point the gap between Perez and Verstappen was five seconds, and with a clear run the smart money would be on the defending champion closing in. But after Alex Albon retired with a brake problem, Verstappen started complaining about driveshaft concerns that reminded him of Saturday’s failure.

“Once I got into P2, it was quite a decent gap, on a track where there’s not a lot of deg. So I tried to close the gap a bit. But then, at one point, I picked up these vibrations on the driveshaft again, on the rear. The team couldn’t see anything, but I’m fairly sure there was something odd going on with the balance since the vibration started to kick in.

“So, at one point, I did the calculations, and I wouldn’t have been able to close that gap to the end with only 10 laps left. So, at one point it’s more important to just settle for second: not having an issue with the car.”

“The safety car again wanted to take the victory away from me in Jeddah, but not this time!”

Perez had kept the gap over four seconds throughout and despite some concerns over whether Verstappen was receiving the same messages to manage his pace, he was able to comfortably cruise home.

“It was going well, when I overtook Fernando I thought I could do my race,” Perez said. “But then the safety car again wanted to take the victory away from me in Jeddah, but not this time! We managed to get a good distance with Max, we kept a healthy lead and that went well.

“I’m proud of getting the victory. We know how strong Max is in the races and we’ve been matching him in Bahrain, we matched him here, so we have to keep working really hard. I think my team is doing a great job, we managed to get a good read on the high fuel, so I’m proud of my team today.”

While there was no racing between the top two, further back Kevin Magnussen was hounding Yuki Tsunoda for the final point behind the Mercedes, Ferrari and Alpine drivers, and duly got through on the penultimate lap at the first corner. There was also some action between the recovering McLarens and Logan Sargeant, who had run strongly for most of the race but was unable to make the hard-medium strategy work as well as Hamilton did as his tyres faded.

The main intrigue was further forward, however. Behind the Red Bulls, a radio message to Russell to stay within five seconds of Alonso hinted at a potential penalty, so Alonso – given the information of Russell’s message – duly pulled over five seconds clear by the flag. Alonso took the the podium and celebrated, but as those celebrations were finishing, the stewards handed him a ten-second time penalty for not serving his original penalty correctly, promoting Russell.

The decision was based on the jack being in contact with the car, and after a farcical few hours with no communication from the FIA as Aston Martin requested a right of review, Alonso’s team was able to prove there was no agreement that the jack touching the car would constitute working on it, and got the penalty overturned more than three hours after the race had ended.

“What a start to the season,” Alonso said. “I mean, probably unthinkable one month ago when we launched the car. But these guys, they made a fantastic car, fantastic execution of the race in Bahrain, and here as well, with the strategy, and the two podiums.”

Ultimately, only Perez could walk away truly happy. Verstappen was left to rue the driveshaft issue in qualifying that limited his chances of victory, despite an impressive recovery, while Alonso had to endure hours of frustration thinking he’d lost his 100th podium in Formula 1.

Russell, too, was happy with his performance to come home fourth ahead of Hamilton, but also went through the podium rollercoaster, while the Ferrari and Alpine teams were disappointed not to have the race pace to threaten the Mercedes pair ahead.

Add in the FIA’s incompetence handling Alonso’s penalty and the competitive picture looking no brighter than two weeks ago, and it wasn’t exactly F1’s finest weekend. Still, 21 more to go, and after some reliability concerns, Red Bull surely can’t win them all.

2023 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix race results

*Includes point for fastest lap