F1 | 2023 Saudi Arabia Grand Prix Result, Lap by Lap, Review & Summary

The 2023 F1 season continues with Sergio Perez winning the Saudi Arabia Grand Prix and our summary covers the 2023 Saudi Arabia Grand Prix Result and as much of the action from the race so you don’t have to. 

This 2023 Saudi Arabia Grand Prix Result Grand Prix Result, Lap by Lap, Review & Summary gives you just enough to catch up with. With just a hint of cynicism, bias, opinion and colour. The perfect bite sized review for those who couldn’t be bothered, or don’t have enough time.

And to see how close our bold predictions were – look back on our Saudi Arabia Grand Prix Preview.

Check out some of our other F1 gear too…

Our 2022 F1 Season Driver Ratings
Our 2023 F1 Bold Predictions
Our 2023 F1 Betting Sepcials
Our 2023 F1 Calendar & Results

2023 Saudi Arabia Prix Result Race Summary

Didn’t see the race live? Don’t have time to watch the whole race? Well here are the top laps where stuff happened. We write these live as we go, sort of like a minute by minute for the football, but marginally more interesting.

Setting the scene – With Max Verstappen’s car failure in Q2 keeping him to 15th on the grid, it has opened up the race like one couldn’t have imagined after most of the weekend before Q2. Perez did the job is securing pole with a worrying margin to the rest, and despite the lowly starting slot Max Verstappen is still second favourite. Alonso seems the nearest challenger, and there’s always a doubt over Sergio Perez under pressure. As for strategy buffs, most drivers are on the Medium tyre except for Lewis Hamilton (Hard) and Charles Leclerc (Soft). Plenty awaits on the fastest street track in the world, although we feel there’s some debate over how much of a street track this is. Perhaps the city is a real life Fast and the Furious.

GRID (Starting Order) – PER ALO RUS SAI STR OCO HAM PIA GAS HUL — (LEC 12th – VER 15th)

Lap 1 – Sergio Perez makes an ordinary start and Fernando Alonso powers past, not after Perez tries a little squeeze into the pit wall. Stroll goes around the outside of Sainz halfway around the lap making it some kind of start for the Aston Martins. Further back Oscar Piastri proves there’s no luck for Australian McLaren drivers as he reports damage on his car. and later pits. For the record Charles Leclerc and Max Verstappen both climb three spots on the opening lap.

ORDER – ALO PER RUS STR SAI OCO HAM GAS LEC ZHO

Lap 3 – McLaren’s bad luck continues in 2023 with Lando Norris in the pit lane just after Oscar Piastri pits. They are now 19th and 20th and not a single Ricciardo around to blame it on. Further ahead Max Verstappen has actually lost a place from lap one and is now behind a pair of Haasholes in Hulkenberg and Magnussen.

Lap 4 – Sergio Perez spoils the party by overtaking Fernando Alonso into turn one. Given the pace of the Red Bull, fans will have to sweat on that Perez will bin it somewhere for this not to be a Stroll in the park. Pardon the pun. Although given Lance Stroll crashes a bit, perhaps a Stroll in the park would be exciting.

Lap 7 – Charles Leclerc gets by Pierre Gasly for 8th place and has Lewis Hamilton just ahead. Max Verstappen has passed the pair of Haasholes and is 11th, and 10th by the time this we finished typing this paragraph. At the front, which is usually where Max is, Sergio Perez is being kept honest by Fernando Alonso and is only eight tenths of a second behind still. Note that someone found Haasholes funny last race, so we will reuse until they say it isn’t funny.

ORDER – PER ALO RUS STR SAI OCO HAM LEC GAS VER

Lap 9 – Lewis Hamilton in trouble with the stewards for weaving on the straight. Well he does like his fashion doesn’t he? Cue some moaning about no grip after Charles Leclerc gets by, and the fact he’s on the hardest possible tyre and no one else is. Making him even more miserable is Max Verstappen getting past on Lap 11. Without incident.

Lap 13 – Charles Leclerc is using the soft tyre well as he passes Ocon for 6th and is now four seconds behind team mate Carlos Sainz despite starting eight grid slots apart. Sainz being told to pit which makes life easy for Leclerc. Max Verstappen overtakes Ocon too, leaving Leclerc and Verstappen just a few seconds apart.

Lap 14 – Lance Stroll pits for new tyres and Sainz doesn’t despite our earlier message. Who knows if that was a Ferrari trick to Aston Martin, or that Ferrari only broadcast that to the TV Coverage and forgot to tell Carlos. Given their strategy in 2022 you can’t rule anything out. He pits on lap 16 and clears Lance Stroll, so we may eat our words. For now.

Lap 17 – Charles Leclerc smells Max Verstappen closing in and pits. He also clears Lance Stroll, so double box ticking for Ferrari. Yellow flags are out and they are because of a broken down Aston Martin. One remembers a crash-inspired win for Alonso over a decade ago for Renault. Surely not…..

Lap 18 – SAFETY CAR DEPLOYED – So now it’s a matter of who pits and who doesn’t. The leaders do of course, and the order stays the same, well sort of. Max Verstappen is the big winner, getting his first stop after Ferraris took one under racing laps. And Yuki Tsunoda, who we almost forgot was in the race, he’s 8th.

ORDER – PER ALO RUS VER SAI HAM LEC TSU OCO GAS

Lap 21 – RACE RESTARTS – Perez backs up the field massively but zooms off just in time to give himself some clear air. No change or crashing, which is mildly disappointing if we’re honest. Although Max Verstappen looks very keen to steal some places ahead of him. So does Lewis Hamilton who successfully steals 5th from Carlos Sainz i na nice move.

Lap 23 – Max Verstappen looks a little tentative in wanting to get past George Russell. Maybe that’s because George Russell has a bit of history of crashing into people then blaming the other driver. Not this time, Max breezes past Russell before the end of the lap.

Lap 25 – Verstappen breezes past Fernando Alonso too. His team mate is just under six seconds up the road. So let’s see how much of that Brazil 2022 hate is left. It’s our big hope for some excitement.

Lap 27 – Ironically, Alex Albon’s Williams looks to be running out of power, because his team is sponsored by Durecell if you;re wondering what the gag was. 

Lap 28 – Max Verstappen making small inroads into Sergio Perez’s lead, but not much. Still 5.1 seconds behind. A closer intra team battle is the Mercedes duo battling for fourth. They could be due a team morale busting clash.

ORDER – PER VER ALO RUS HAM SAI LEC OCO GAS TSU

Lap 36 – If you’re wondering about the lack of typing, it’s because there’s a lack of action. This is symbolised by a Williams of Logan Sargeant being the focal point of the coverage in his battle for 12th. There’s Charles Leclerc whinging to his team about Ferrari’s current position. And an Alfa Romeo pit. Max Verstappen is gaining about a tenth of a second per lap, which means this race will need another 45 laps for him to pass Perez. And after getting up at 3am to watch this, we ain’t hanging around for another 40 laps.

Lap 38 – Max Verstappen is on the radio complaining about his driveshaft. Now this could be interesting given his DNF from qualifying. Might explain why he isn’t catching Sergio Perez. The Mexican extends two fingers to his team mate with a new fastest lap.

Lap 42 – Max Verstappen’s car is still going, as is the race without much action now. The TV is still showing Logan Sargeant, but now for the battle between the the back of the grid cars of the race. Lando Norris got a sniff of an overtake down the pit straight, but the McLaren looks to be towing a couple of imaginary elephants and he has no straight line speed.

Lap 46 – Nice overtaking battle between Kevin Magnussen and Yuki Tsunoda for the final championship point. It goes to the Haas driver.

Last lap – Max Verstappen looks to return the two fingers and steal the fastest lap on the last lap. There’s nothing else happening, so why not. Sergio Perez cruises to victory and leads a Red Bull 1-2. There are only 15 seconds ahead of third placed Fernando Alonso this time. Alonso stays more than five seconds ahead of George Russell, which may be important if a potential five second penalty is applied.

FINAL ORDER – PER VER ALO RUS HAM SAI LEC OCO GAS MAG

Here we go through the field and highlight the very best (Great) of the race, and the plodders, the over-ambitious, the out of luck, and simply hopeless (Grape).

These points get added to our Driver of the Season scores. Five points for a great nomination, and -5 for the worst or grapest driver in the pack. Then it is +2 /-2 for honourable or dishonourable mentions.

THE GREAT-EST – SERGIO PEREZ

Pretty hard to have a better race. Your team mate and closest rival bombs out of qualifying with car troubles. Perez takes pole position, regains the lead quickly after initially falling behind, led with ease, held fastest lap for a lot of the race.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

MAX VERSTAPPEN – 15th to 2nd is a decent damage control result. Car troubles aside, he probably would have won this race by a Time Zone.

FERNANDO ALONSO – Best of the rest all weekend, but missed his chance at pole position after Max Verstappen’s issue. Although, the Aston Martin and Alonso aren’t that good yet.

OSCAR PIASTRI – Despite suffering first lap damage and having to pit, thereby relegating him to a back of the field kind of evening, he made Q3 in qualifying and out-qualified his team mate. HE also overtakes his team mate and another car towards the end of the race. Some kind of achievement, and a small glimpse of his powers. The McLaren is still shit though.

MERCEDES – Look to be ahead of Ferrari and not far off the ASton Martin pace. Things looked much worse after Bahrain,

THE GRAPE-EST – LANCE STROLL

More for the back luck than bad driving. Although out-qualified by his team mate, few expect him to. Did well to overtake Carlos Sainz early on too. But he lost a lot of good points with car failure, so will be the most disappointed by the result.

DIS-HONOURABLE MENTIONS

LANDO NORRIS – One wonders if he will be at McLaren in 2024, as battling at the very back of the field is well below where his talents deserve.

CHARLES LECLERC – After making great progress from a lowly 12th starting slot, he went nowhere after his pitstop and complained to his team about the current situation. 

VALTTERI BOTTAS – Lost places on the start as per usual, then spent the race right at the back of the field. A even more obcure 

Was it a good race, loads of action, tense, or just a big, fat, snooze-fest.

We rate the big race itself so we know which races to go back and watch in the off season or one to simply remember the winner for the post season quiz nights.

SEASON IMPORTANCE –  5 / 10

Early days, but this race did prove that the Red Bull isn’t bulletproof. And that Sergio Perez is quite capable. He will need to be if there’s a drivers championship in this season.

ON TRACK ACTION – 4/10

An exciting enough opening few laps, with Max Verstappen and Charles Leclerc coming back through the field, but not much at all after the Safety Car. So we scored it 4/5 for the first half of the race and 0/5 for the second half.

ENDING 1 / 10

Not much happening at all. With a battle for 15th, 10th and maybe Max Verstappen’s car potentially breaking down.

OVERALL RATING 10 / 30

Was it worth getting up at 3am for? Of course. Will we watch it again. Shit no.

2023 SEASON RATINGS SO FAR

Want to know what we thought of previous races? Or which ones to to back and watch? 

R1 Bahrain Grand Prix 26/30

2023 F1 Season Power Rankings

Stay tuned for our Power Rankings from the race soon as it is currently being calculated and will be ready on Monday.

Who not check out the other races this season.

R1 – Bahrain Grand Prix

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