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Formula 1 Emilia Romagna GP Analysis
The themes to watch in F1’s Imola return
By: Alex Kalinauckas
Apr 13, 2021, 9:09 AM
Three weeks is a long time in Formula 1, but in the reshaped start to the 2021 season the teams head to Imola to pick things up after the frenetic Bahrain opener. Here's what to look out for and the developments to follow at the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix

The second Emilia Romagna Grand Prix possesses something reassuringly familiar in the current uncertain climate: it’s the start of the European F1 spring.


Usually, the teams would be heading to Barcelona after a travelling back from Australia via the Middle East and Asia, but 2021 had just one initial flyaway. The Bahrain season opener was a thriller, with notable themes at the front of the field immediately emerging. But, as well as those motifs likely continuing this weekend, the Imola event is significant for every squad.

At the front, Red Bull has F1’s fastest car, but hasn’t got a victory to show for it thanks to Mercedes’ aggressive Bahrain strategy calls, plus Lewis Hamilton’s continuing tyre management excellence. The question is whether Red Bull can stay ahead and convert its promise into a nerve-settling win this weekend. Mercedes certainly expects its rival to be so thanks to the high-speed sections of the 19-turn layout, which don’t suit the W12.

But a return to Europe plus the three-week gap since Bahrain means there’s every chance that the teams will take this opportunity to tweak their 2021 machines with update packages within the limits of this season’s design-carryover rules. Mercedes hinted in pre-season it would reveal its token upgrade spend in due course, which suggests it still has something to add to the W12 given it ran its testing specification to victory in Bahrain.


Red Bull can of course make further tweaks to improve the RB16B package that looked so good last time out, but with the need to consider when to switch resources to the 2022 cars and keep under the new cost cap, it’s not a given that teams will bring updates to every race this year.



In the pack behind the leaders, Alpine has already acted, opting to bring an aerodynamic upgrade package to this weekend’s event after confirming “some of the weaknesses of our package” in Bahrain, per team executive director Marcin Budkowski.

But while the physical changes will be apparent when the cars take to the track on Friday, there will be additional unseen elements of progress that the teams will be eyeing this weekend.

Red Bull needs Sergio Perez to make an impression in the lead fight. The Mexican was dropped to the back of the field through no fault of his own in Bahrain, but he would’ve been starting outside the top 10 even without what is now described as a formation lap electrical issue by the team. He fought back impressively in the race, but that just won’t be possible this weekend if he qualifies down the order again given passing will be a rare event should the race run interrupted throughout.

If, as Mercedes expects, Red Bull and Verstappen lead the way again in qualifying, plus there’s the potential Perez improvement against the clock, then it will be interesting to see which of the Black Arrows drivers is the nearest challenger
“My goal is to have a good race and I’m looking forward to the weekend,” Perez says ahead of the race. “Hopefully in Imola we can come back and be in contention to fight for a podium and hopefully the win. Unlike Bahrain, qualifying is very important at Imola as you can hardly overtake there – but I like it.”


The 2020 Emilia Romagna GP showcased exactly why Red Bull needs two cars in the lead fight, as Mercedes was able to put Hamilton onto a strategy that would’ve likely got him back ahead of Max Verstappen even without fortuitous virtual safety car timing, using its 2-1 advantage to great effect.

In that race, Hamilton triumphed despite it being a weekend where Valtteri Bottas had had an edge, right up until he ran over a piece of Ferrari bodywork that Sebastian Vettel had lost against Kevin Magnussen’s Haas.

If, as Mercedes expects, Red Bull and Verstappen lead the way again in qualifying, plus there’s the potential Perez improvement against the clock, then it will be interesting to see which of the Black Arrows drivers is the nearest challenger. Hamilton looked more at home in the troublesome W12 in Bahrain, where Bottas also compromised his race with a slow first lap, but the Finn can look back on F1’s last visit to Imola for inspiration.


Although Ferrari has taken a significant step forwards compared to its 2020 nightmare, it seems as if the Scuderia will need its drivers to deliver their own brilliance this weekend.

Charles Leclerc shone at Imola last year with a performance similar to the one he produced in Bahrain – qualifying higher than the car deserved to be and then hanging on in the race. Imola’s tight-but-rapid nature means he won’t necessarily slide backwards this time around if he can get another lofty grid spot. Carlos Sainz Jr gets a first chance to race for Ferrari in Italy and will be out to make an impression.

Another home-hero squad for this weekend is AlphaTauri, which lost the chance for an impressive 2020 result at Imola to a radiator weld failure on Pierre Gasly’s car. The Frenchman put in another impressive qualifying display in Bahrain, but ruined it clattering Daniel Ricciardo early in the race. This weekend, he gets the chance to reinforce his team’s potential at a track where he was very fast last year, while the early career momentum gathering around Yuki Tsunoda will increase if he impresses again at this tricky track.

While Aston Martin seems to have gone from podium chasing with Perez at Imola last year to a likely struggle to make Q3 and the points in 2021 – largely thanks to the rear floor changes that have also hampered Mercedes considerably – McLaren was best of the rest in Bahrain. This weekend offers the perfect chance to solidify its progress after the team was unexpectedly at the back of the fluctuating midfield scrap and in a weekend of ‘damage limitation’ on its way to seventh and eighth at Imola last year.

Alfa Romeo is another team out to show its Bahrain pace and progress was not a one-off, while Haas will be hoping its drivers can keep their cars pointing in the right direction across the weekend.

At Williams, a George Russell redemption story is waiting to be written given his embarrassing safety car crash here in 2020. But he’ll need to ace qualifying, as he did last year and in Bahrain last time out, plus race as strongly as he did nearly six months ago to be in points contention if something unexpected occurs.



That’s what Imola offers. It’s a fearsome track – an “iconic old-school track with a fast and flowing layout that provides little room for error”, per McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo – with many bumps to test the drivers, as well having an unusual anti-clockwise layout.

A straightforward race will mean a certain one-stopper because the pitlane time is so high, but the challenging layout (with close gravel traps at most corners hopefully putting the tedious track limits debate on ice for a while!) means there’s every chance a dull affair could be enlivened very quickly.

But overtaking will still be very difficult, even with a longer DRS zone this year. So, if it’s close – from the off or late-on as things shake out – it’ll likely be tense.