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The 2023 F1 Miami GP could not have come sooner for a few drivers on the grid.
The sprint weekend format was not a fun one for quite a few drivers. With limited preparation time on the table, it certainly seemed to make things worse for most drivers. Sergio Perez, who took honors in both races, was arguably the only exception to that rule.
Fortunately for those other drivers, there's only a week's break between the race in Baku and the 2023 F1 Miami GP. They will get the opportunity to wipe the slate clean and get that bitter taste of Baku out of their mouth.
Which teams are in need of a good display more than the others? Well, let's take a look.
2023 F1 Miami GP: Top 3 teams desperate for a good result
#1 Alpine
Alpine came to Baku on the back of an impressive (although fruitless weekend) in Australia. The team showed it had the capability to hang with the top four, although it still lacked something overall.
Alpine was the first outfit to bring a major set of upgrades (alongside McLaren) in Baku. The French team felt that these upgrades were the key to bringing in close to six-tenths of a second.
The jeopardy-filled nature of the Baku weekend meant we could not see any of it and Alpine came home with nothing. In all fairness, the team has been unable to get their season kickstarted in the first four races.
The speed is there and the drivers are strong, but it has just been one bad circumstance after the other that has left them with not much to show.
The 2023 F1 Miami GP will give Alpine the opportunity to fully understand its upgrades and see what kind of impact they will have. The weekend in Miami is crucial for the team as it tries to get its season back on track.
#2 Ferrari
For Ferrari, the weekend in Baku was an affirmation of the car that it had.
The start of the season has not been as impressive as Ferrari had hoped. It was too far behind Red Bull on pace and too peaky overall. After the first race in Baku, where Ferrari appeared to have the second-best car, the races in Jeddah and Australia saw the team fall back.
This is precisely why the weekend in Baku was a godsend. Charles Leclerc's favorite track supplemented a strong showing for the team with pole position in both races.
The 2023 F1 Miami GP is just as crucial for Ferrari if not more.
Both Fernando Alonso and George Russell have indicated that the car was probably flattered by the track and conditions in Baku. In their view, normal service will resume at the 2023 F1 Miami GP. This is exactly the trend that Ferrari has to prevent.
The team is bringing its first set of upgrades and these upgrades should help the team improve and make major leaps. The aim has to be to emulate what happened in Baku.
Ferrari will be hoping for another intense battle with Red Bull in qualifying and a stronger race trim performance at the 2023 F1 Miami GP.
#3 McLaren
McLaren put together a much stronger weekend at Baku. Lando Norris was able to comfortably secure a Q3 slot and start the race inside the top 10. Not only that, the McLaren driver also secured points in a rather comfortable manner without much of an issue.
After the race, though, Norris was still not too confident of the progress the team had made. He admitted that while the upgrades worked, he was not sure how much the improvement would translate to other tracks.
For McLaren, the 2023 F1 Miami GP is going to be crucial. The Woking-based squad has brought a set of upgrades that were, in essence, flattered by poor weekends from Alpine and Haas.
The team heads to the 2023 F1 Miami GP race weekend looking for validation that the kind of work it has done has helped close the gap to the front of the midfield. The race in Miami will also be crucial for morale as McLaren tries to secure a strong result and build on the momentum of the last two races.
