2020 Portuguese GP Tips and Preview

We had another profitable weekend in the Eifel GP with Carlos Sainz finishing in the top 6, 2 points advised at 3.25 on the blog by James Punt. He also advised winning bets at 2.87, 6.50 and 2.87 on the TXApp, make sure you download it to get more tips for qualifying and on race day. You can read James’ 2020 Portuguese GP tips and preview below…

2020 Portuguese GP Tips: New Circuit

The revived Portuguese GP will take place on a circuit never used for a F1 race before. The Autodromo Internacional do Algarve is situated near Portimao in the Algarve region. It was opened in 2008 and was used for winter testing that year. Some drivers such as Bottas, Ricciardo and Leclerc have raced there in junior formula.

The track was built with testing in mind and as a result it is not unlike Barcelona in that it features a long straight to test power, a long duration final corner, a few fast bends and three slow hairpin style corners. There are 15 corners in total and it is a quite a technical looking lay out. There are not many obvious overtaking places. The fifth corner, a slow hairpin at the end of a medium length straight, will be the main opportunity.

The track features changes in elevation, much like Mugello. It is a very modern facility but for once not designed by Herman Tilke. It looks like a medium to high downforce set up will be required with the usual compromises needed to give grip in the corners but not too much drag on the faster sections.

Fast and Flowing Track

Drivers that have raced there say it is a fast, flowing track with changes in elevation,. There are some blind corners and some corners that reward late braking. Good news for Hamilton and Ricciardo then, two of the very best late brakers.

Comparisons have also been made to Mugello in terms of the physical demands on the drivers, the flowing nature of the track and the elevation changes. Of course, it is hard to get much out of the Mugello form as it was quite mad.

Two red flags and eight DNF’s severely muddied the waters. We were on Verstappen to win that race and it was looking interesting after qualifying, with Verstappen 3rd and making up a place before his car died after a few hundred yards. We never got to see if the tyre wear issues that were expected would have moved the race to the Red Bull.

The weather will be much more pleasant that it was in Germany two weeks ago. Friday and Saturday are sunny and warm, with temps between 18 and 24 degrees am/pm. Sunday sees some cloud cover coming in with a 25% of some light drizzle.

The Best Car Should Win

Technical, made for testing tracks generally rewards the best car. We have already raced at Barcelona, in the middle of August, and that was won by Lewis Hamilton. It was the usual Mercedes 1-2 in qualifying, but Verstappen finished second ahead of Bottas in third. It was a pillar to post win for Hamilton who was 24 seconds clear of Verstappen. Bottas had a poor start and dropped to fourth place off the line. Perez crossed the line in fourth place, but he was demoted to fifth thanks to a 5 second penalty. That elevated teammate Stroll to fourth.

It was a pretty dull race and after a run of some entertaining race weekends, I suspect that this one could be a bit boring. Hopefully not knowing the track may mix things up. However, the track lay out and a settled weather forecast means that there will be plenty of running on Friday. Thus, there should be no problems with a lack of data to get the best set up.

We are at the stage of the season where there may be grid penalties for some drivers if they need new power unit components etc, like Bottas perhaps? All the drivers bar Ocon and Sainz are one component change away from a grid penalty. That makes ante post betting more risky, but the sword has two sides.

No Surprises In Spain

The whole Spanish GP weekend went to script. Qualifying saw Mercedes 1-2, Verstappen third, the two racing Points 4-5, Albon sixth, McLaren 7-8, Ferrari 9 and 11, Alpha Tauri 10 and 12. The only surprise was Renault stiffing in 13-15.

Since then Renault have developed their car to be a good all rounder and I would be surprised to see a repeat. In the race, not much changed. Vettel ran a one stopper and moved up to seventh place. Norris dropped to tenth at the start and remained there.

The Mugello race form is weak but in qualifying it was another Mercedes 1-2, a Red Bull 3-4, Leclerc in fifth for Ferrari. Racing Point were 6-7, Renault 8 and 10 with Carlos Sainz ninth.

It was the usual Mercedes 1-2 but it was a good track for Red Bull. Albon qualified in a season’s best fourth and locked out the second row alongside Verstappen. Red Bull have worked on improving the cars rear end stability. With two weeks since the last race, they have had time to refine that.

The changes to the power unit settings regulations have blunted Mercedes advantage somewhat, but it does not matter if you qualify 2 tenths faster or two seconds, the result is still pole position. Red Bull may well be closer in qualifying, but it is the race that counts.

Renault Tough To Weigh Up

Renault are harder to call. They have made genuine progress, but they were very poor in Spain and while a lot better at Mugello, eighth on the grid for Ricciardo is his worst grid place in the last five races. There has to be something of a question mark over them as to who will be ‘best of the rest’.

With just six more races to go and another two championships all but in the bag for Mercedes/Hamilton, Mercedes have ended any further development of this year’s car and did so some time ago. There will no more new parts or upgrades.

Red Bull on the other hand introduced another upgrade in the last race aimed at sorting out an unstable rear end. Max Verstappen liked the improvements and got closer to the Mercs in qualifying as a result. The fact that there was no running on Friday in Germany was blow for Red Bull as they had very little time to evaluate and fine tune the new parts. Despite that, the car was better. With a couple of weeks back at the factory, they will have had the opportunity to optimise the new upgrade.

It is always the same. Red Bull start the season with a car that isn’t fully baked and then spend the rest of the season trying to play catch up, which they generally achieve at the end of the season, when it’s too late. We should expect the gap between the two to close between now and the last race of the season, and maybe see more wins for Verstappen.

Verstappen Will Punish Any Hamilton Mistakes

Looking at the championship table, we see Hamilton way out in front and the title all but won. Bottas is second and 48 points clear of Verstappen in third place. However, Verstappen, when both drivers completed the race, is 5-2 up against Bottas. The Dutchman has had three DNF’s which has hurt his standing in the table. However, with one win and five second places, when he finishes the race, he is the closest to Hamilton. He is the man most likely to take the win if Hamilton has a problem.

The fact that his Red Bull is closing the performance gap just makes him a bigger threat. Hamilton acknowledged the fact at the end of the Eifel GP by saying ‘they are getting closer guys’. It will not have any impact on the world championship.  However, we should expect Verstappen to get a couple more wins this season.

Pole Position looks less likely than a race win and the question is when to back Verstappen? He is a 5.50 shot now but if he qualifies in his usual third place, he may drift, but probably not by much.

2020 Portuguese GP Tips: 2 points Max Verstappen to win the Portuguese GP at 5.50 with BET365, William Hill

Daniel Ricciardo’s podium finish in Germany means we have had seven different teams and ten different drivers getting a podium finish this season. In a season were one team has locked out the front row of the grid in nine of the eleven races, that is surprising. Obviously, the Italian GP was a freak result and accounted for three of those podiums.

Perhaps what is a bigger surprise is that Sergio Perez has not yet had a podium. The Racing Point has been the second-best car on occasions, and certainly the third best car most of the time. They have come under pressure from McLaren and now Renault for third place in the constructor’s championship. They don’t have the same resources as Renault and have not developed their car very much in comparison.

Perez missed two races due to the corona virus and when Racing Point did introduce an upgrade it was put on Stroll’s car. Perez was due to get it in Russia but Stroll’s big crash at Mugello meant they didn’t have enough spare parts and Perez only got the upgrade at the Eifel GP. He finished that race in fourth for the second race in succession.

The reality remains that if anyone outside of Mercedes or Verstappen is to get a podium, they need one or more of the big three to retire or have a serious problem, as was the case with Mercedes at Silverstone. Nobody has beaten the ‘big three’ on merit.

A podium for the likes of Perez, Ricciardo, Sainz etc. may be harder this weekend. Red Bull may have two drivers in the hunt for a top 3 finish, rather than the usual one.

2020 Portuguese GP Tips: Albon An Interesting Contender

Alex Albon in the second Red Bull has had a poor year. Being Max Verstappen’s teammate is proving to be a poisoned chalice and Albon is being made to look poor. However, he may actually be a truer gauge of the Red Bull car. It has not been easy to drive for much of the year. The front end was unstable earlier in the season, and latterly, the rear end has been loose.

The latest upgrade at the Eifel GP has addressed that and hopefully the car will now be more drivable. Verstappen is a great talent and great talents can find ways to drive around problems in a car. Mortal’s need a better car.

Albon has been better over a race distance than in qualifying. He just hasn’t the faith in the car to really push it in qualifying, but his best effort came at Mugello, something of a guide for this weekend. He qualified fourth and finished third after Verstappen’s retirement.

There were some encouraging signs in Germany last time out for Albon. He qualified fifth, much better than his seasonal average of 7.72. He wasn’t able to finish the race due to car problems (and the fact that he had made a mess of the race by crashing into Kvyat and getting a penalty).

Clearly, if Albon can qualify in the top 6 again, his chances of a top 6 finish are greatly enhanced. He raced here in Formula 3, taking pole position and finishing third.

2020 Portuguese GP Tips: 2 points Alex Albon to finish in the top 6 @ 2.00 with William Hill

McLaren introduced a new nose at the Eifel GP and Carlos Sainz finished fifth with it. However, he was helped by others misfortunes and he was quite vocal in saying that the car was poor. There will be some more new parts to test on Friday as the team work to refine their aerodynamic package.

McLaren are not having a good run with a mix of unreliability and driver errors resulting in just two points scoring finishes across the last three races. Those finishes were both top 6, so the car is competitive when everything comes together, but they are a high-risk proposition at the moment.

Ferrari Making Progress

Ferrari are slowly heading the right direction but still saying that it will not be until 2022 until they are likely to be fully competitive again. They can perform well on certain track lay outs. They prefer corners to straights and high downforce to medium or low downforce. This track features a long, flat out, downhill curve, leading into the long start/finish straight. It is a significant portion of the lap and it is not Ferrari friendly.

We backed Leclerc at Mugello due to its high downforce nature and it nearly worked. He was fifth on the grid, made a good start and found himself in 3rd place. That was his undoing. The Ferrari was decent in the corners but when he reached the long straight he was a sitting duck. The cars following him got DRS and just drove past the underpowered Ferrari. This lay out look to have a similar lay out to Mugello and the Ferrari, while liking the corners, will find it hard to defend their position on the straight.

That said, Leclerc is still doing a great job in a bad car. He qualified fifth and fourth in two of the last three races and while he cannot match that over a race distance, he is still a regular points finisher and knocking on the top 6 door. Vettel on the other hand is just going through the motions. Leclerc is a 1.57 shot to finish in the points again which looks about right.

Kyvat Represents Value

One driver who does look a touch of value for more points is Daniil Kvyat in the Alpha Tauri. His run of three consecutive points finishes ended with a fifteenth place in the Eifel GP. He was going well unit he was hit by Alex Albon, which required him to have a new front win fitted and damaged the car, hurting his performance.

The team are operating well and know their job. He will qualify around thirteenth and run a long first stint, picking off the less competitive cars who qualified in the top 10 and starting on the softest tyres. It is a strategy that works well for the team and while it took them a while to figure it out, they are now able to score with two cars in the points despite not being great in qualifying.

2020 Portuguese GP Tips: 2 points Daniil Kvyat to finish in the top 10 @ 2.10 with Boylesports

2020 Portuguese GP Tips: 1 point Alpha Tauri double points finish @ 3.25 with BET365, William Hill

Updates for qualifying and the race will be posted on the TXODDS app as usual, around 30 minutes before the start of each session.

-JamesPunt