Miami, scene of the new battle between Ferrari and Red Bull

Charles Leclerc (Ferrari), leader of the Formula One World Championship, and Carlos Sainz -along with the one who also heads the Constructors’ World Cup- will try to stop Red Bull’s progress in debutant Miami (USA), this weekend’s venue for the fifth Grand Prix of the year; team which was led by Dutchman Max Verstappen, the last world champion, two Sundays ago, in Imola (Italy), a ‘double’ completed by Mexican Sergio Pérez.

Verstappen, 24, achieved his second victory of the season, in the two races he has completed; and Red Bull responded to Imola at the extraordinary start of the ‘Scuderia’ season: Dutchman and ‘Czech’ mimic the ‘double’ achieved by Leclerc and Sainz in the first race, in Bahrain; and ‘Mad Max’ repeated, at the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, the ‘Grand Chelem’ (win from pole position, with the fastest lap and leading the race from start to finish) signed by the World Championship leader just two weeks before in Australia.

Coincidentally, Red Bull provided little psychological touch to the most successful team in history. In his own home, at the Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari; which, after being defeated by Australian Daniel Ricciardo (McLaren), Sainz ended his performance in the first change.

In a race where, with nine laps left, when he was running third, Leclerc -same age as Verstappen- made a mistake that caused him to leave the track, damaging the front wing. The driver from the Côte d’Azur principality had to pit again and drop six spots at once, before recovering three again to finish sixth.

After the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, the first of the season in which qualifying was decided by a sprint test — this year there will be two more, in Austria and Brazil—, which Verstappen scored before Leclerc, The new sports idol from the Netherlands is second in the World Cup, 27 points from 86 where Monegasque leads.

‘Checo’, who repeated in Imola the second place achieved in Melbourne and signed on his seventeenth podium in the premier class, was third, with 54; five more than Englishman George Russell (Mercedes) and 16 more Sainz – Second in Bahrain and third in Saudi Arabia, which dropped to fifth overall after their second consecutive retirement.

Another Spaniard, the double Asturian world champion Fernando Alonso (Alpine), has not escaped Imola from the misfortune that has followed him since the campaign began; and, after riding at a good pace over the weekend, he had to retire after the seventh lap.

At first he was gently touched by German Haas Mick Schumacher and, Once the race was relaunched after the departure of the safety vehicle that entered after Sainz’s disaster, a piece of his Alpine pontoon disappeared.; adding to his collection of misfortunes so far this year, with two retirements in four races and a slight haul of two points that put him in fifteenth place at the World Championship.

Miami made its World Cup debut on an urban circuit built around Hard Rock Stadium, where the Miami Dolphins, a team from the NFL, the professional American football league, play at home. Whose final, the ‘SuperBowl’, has been played six times in this stadium; which also hosts the Masters 1000 tennis tournament in that city: won this year by Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz.

The one that will host the aforementioned town in the state of Florida is one of two races that will take place this year in the United States, with the Grand Prix being held on October 23, as usual for ten years, at the Circuit of the Americas from Austin, Texas. And Miami will be the eleventh circuit on U.S. soil to host a Formula One race.

The first, in 1959, was Sebring, also in Florida, about 270 kilometers north of Miami: a track which Alonso won three years ago, along with a Toyota, at the WEC. He won the 1,000 Miles of Sebring, one of the tests of the World Endurance Championship, which the great Asturian driver won before returning to F1 last year.

The Miami circuit is 5,412 meters long, with 19 corners -high and low speeds, seven of them on the right-, long straight and three DRS zones. A narrower track in some areas than a ‘conventional’ circuit, so the entry of more than one safety vehicle on Sunday is predictable, and it is not excluded that a red flag will be waved throughout the weekend.

Expect high temperatures, up to 30 degrees Celsius. And they will all compete in virgin territory, so it is important to adapt as soon as possible to the characteristics of the track. Where, starting this Friday, when the free practice begins, it will be rolled using wheels from the intermediate set of compounds: C2 (hard, identifiable by white stripes), C3 (medium, yellow stripes) and C4 ( soft, red).

Rehearsals (for a Grand Prix to be held during Central European afternoon and evening hours) will be completed on Saturday, a few hours before qualifying -again in the standard format, with rounds of elimination- that will command the race on Sunday: scheduled for 57 laps, to complete a 308.3-kilometer route.

Whatever happens in Miami, where ‘Checo’ will be counted —in a weekend his teammate Verstappen predicts will be “crazy” – With the support of the large public in Latin America, Leclerc will lead the next race: the Spanish Grand Prix, which will take place on the 22nd of this month in Montmeló (Barcelona).

Sainz, who has not finished the last two races, will try to regain the path of honor positions in Florida, where Alonso also hopes his luck will be reversed, the owner of Spain’s 32 victories in F1 throughout its history and usually one of the fastest to adapt to new situations; as he showed last year in his Qatar debut: where, seven years later, he once again climbed into a box. Added her 98th podium in the queen category.

F1 intends to install in Miami, where all tickets are sold out in an instant, a sort of American Monaco Grand Prix. And the atmosphere, luxury and party, is overwhelming. Verstappen and “Checo” visited with players of the Marlins, the local baseball team.

And Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes), the ‘record man’ in the premier class, who was ousted by ‘Mad Max’ last year and finished – seventh in the World Cup, 58 points behind Leclerc – is far from signing the start of the desired season, he amused himself playing golf with another legend, Tom Bradythe veteran quarterback (game organizer) of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers (also in Florida).

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The only player in history to have seven rings — six of them with the New England Patriots — in the NFL: the same number of world titles as ‘Sir’ Lewis.