2022 F1 Austrian GP: Winners and Losers

The F1 Austrian GP was a feel-good race in so many ways. Charles Leclerc was able to win an F1 race after a long dry spell. It was a fantastic weekend for Mick Schumacher as he won the Driver of the Day title. Keeping all of this aside, the F1 Austrian GP weekend was not as fulfilling for everyone. There are certainly going to be a few slumped shoulders in the paddock after a rough outing.

Let's look at both sides of the coin as we take a look at the winners and losers of the race.

---

2022 F1 Austrian GP: Who won and who lost?

Winner

Charles Leclerc

Over the last year and a half, the spotlight has shone brightly on Max Verstappen. So much so that many pundits seemed to have forgotten how great a talent Charles Leclerc is. The F1 Austrian GP was where all of this came to a head as, for the first time since the Australian GP, Leclerc was able to fight Verstappen on an even footing.

Ferrari had much better downforce and the Monegasque made the most of it by winning the race. This was a "Verstappen-beating" performance by the driver and the team. The duo will be hoping to build on this momentum before Red Bull strikes back.

Loser

Carlos Sainz

The entire F1 Austrian GP weekend was an impressive one for Carlos Sainz. Since his win at the F1 British GP, he has not looked back. He was aggressive but fair against Leclerc in Saturday's Sprint. However, during the race on Sunday, the Spaniard did not have the pace to keep up with his teammate.

As a result, P2 looked sensible enough for Sainz. However, it was a disappointing Sunday for him as he was forced to retire after his car caught on flames. Sainz is now 37-points behind Leclerc. With this DNF, his gap to his teammate has increased once again. It will be interesting to see if he can close the gap to Leclerc once again.

Winner

Mick Schumacher

It was Mick Schumacher's first complete weekend in F1 that was good. The German was quite upset with his team for putting him in a situation where he was forced to fend-off Lewis Hamilton in the F1 Austrian GP Sprint because he believed that he was faster than his teammate Kevin Magnussen.

On Sunday, however, the Haas driver showed enough speed that the team allowed him to get ahead of his teammate and pursue Esteban Ocon in fifth. While the Alpine driver was out of reach, Schumacher put together an authoritative performance with a P6 finish. The German has got some momentum behind him now, let's see if he can build on it.

Loser

Mercedes

Mercedes did not suffer from porpoising or bouncing issues of any kind at the F1 Austrian GP. The whole phenomenon was not even part of the discussion for the entire weekend. That should have helped the German squad be a bit more competitive against Red Bull and Ferrari, right? Not really as the team suffered from too much drag during the race.

The drag left the car as a bit of a handful for both Lewis Hamilton and George Russell. Even in clear air, Mercedes was some distance behind the Red Bull and Ferrari challengers, which was indicative of the performance deficit the car still faces.

Winner

Esteban Ocon

Esteban Ocon has struggled in the last few races to keep up with Fernando Alonso. This is something that has been evident this weekend, the British GP, and even the Canadian GP for that matter. There is one thing, however, that the French driver does every weekend that is heartening to watch. He's very good when it comes to plugging away every weekend and bit by bit closing the gap on his teammate.

The Austrian GP was another example of that as Esteban Ocon kept closing the gap to Fernando Alonso in every session and finally when the Spaniard faltered, Ocon was there, getting the maximum out of the car. After a strong qualifying, the Frenchman did not falter in the race as he kept every midfield car behind him and ended up scoring a P5 in his 100th race.

Loser

Fernando Alonso

Fernando Alonso's fortunes have been a monumental disappointment this season. The Spaniard was driving beautifully throughout the weekend but the broken floor in Q3 messed up his final position. If that wasn't all, the electric failure before the start of the F1 Austrian GP Sprint forced a DNF on Saturday, and then on Sunday, Alonso was in contention to score a strong result, which got ruined because of a poor pit stop where a wheel did not fit properly.

Everything that could go wrong for the Spaniard went wrong in what has been a strange first half of the season for the Alpine driver.

It will be interesting to see which teams and drivers make progress over the next two weeks for the French GP.