2024 Austrian GP Outright Betting Preview

Now, it is time for James Punt’s 2024 Austrian GP outright betting preview. It was a struggle for us in Spain last weekend but James is hoping to bounce back immediately.   

2024 Austrian GP Preview

It was a bad couple of days at the office last weekend. Seven bets, six lost and -7.17 points down. That means the YTD is +8.86 and we need to get back to winning ways soon. We hit the post with Norris, again, and we are due one.

Race 11 of the 2024 F1 season comes from the picturesque Red Bull Ring, Spielberg, in Austria. The track is very short, very fast and produces great races. It also produces a lot of track limit issues.

Last season’s race saw over 1200 investigations into track limits being exceeded. The stewards were still going through them hours after the race and it was a very unsatisfactory state of affairs. As was the unedifying sight of drivers grassing up the car in front, trying to have it penalised.

The layout of the track means to get the best lines and fastest laps, the drivers need to go wide in the corners. Some apexes are blind and some are off camber, making it very easy to get all four wheels over the line.

Gravel Traps

The FIA have introduced steps to try and improve the situation. The track has introduced gravel traps on some of the problem corners, meaning the drivers will lose time by going over the line. Other corners will now use AI to quickly determine if a car has crossed the track limit.

You will notice a blue line between the white line marking the track limit and the kerbs. This makes it clearer where the demarcation line is. Cameras will monitor the lines and the AI will flag up cars that have gone too far. It remains to be seen how much this will improve things.

The track is just over 4km long and it only takes just over one minute to complete a lap. It is fast and furious, like a go kart track on steroids. Officially, there are just ten corners, but two of those are more like kinks.

Lots Of Data

The circuit returned to the calendar in 2014, the same year as the turbo hybrid regulations kicked. It has hosted twelve Grand Prix as it was the venue for two races in 2020 and 2021, billed as the Styrian GP. The teams have plenty of data available and even the relatively new drivers have done plenty of laps here.

It is a track that has corners that encourage overtaking under braking, most notably into the third corner, which is a tight, uphill hairpin. That has been the scene of many good overtakes, and many not so good.

That is the highest point on the circuit and from there on, there is a charge back down the hill. Turn four is another heavy braking hairpin, which is off camber and it is easy to make an ill judged lunge which ends in tears and in the gravel.

Power Rewarded

It may be just a wee, short track, but it packs a punch and is very entertaining. It rewards power, there are three decent straights, including a long uphill climb form turn 1 to turn 3. There are six fast corners in the second half of the race and overall, it is a high speed circuit.

From the twelve Grand Prix here, the pole position driver has won seven. The attrition rate is very volatile. The average over the twelve races is 3.00, with a high of seven and a low of zero. Over the last five races, it is 2.00.

This has been a Sprint race venue for the last two years, and it will be again this weekend.

2024 Austrian GP: Weather Forecast

The weather up in the mountains can be anything, and this weekend we may get a bit of everything. It is going to be hot, especially on Saturday.

Friday is set to be partly cloudy, 27 degrees with a chance of late afternoon showers. Saturday will be hotter, nudging 30 degrees, with only a small chance of rain. Raceday will be a little cooler at 28 degrees, but still hot. Partly cloudy, with a 40% chance of rain. Other forecasts have that threat nearer 20%.

The overwhelming feature will be the heat and now that affects tyre wear. A shower may come into play at some point, but the track will dry very quickly.

Team-by-Team outlook

Red Bull 

Verstappen is living a bit of a charmed life lately, picking up wins he didn’t really deserve. He was lucky in Imola, Montreal and Barcelona. Lando Norris could have won all three. The fact that he won in Spain last week was down to Norris making a poor start and then getting held up in traffic after his first stop. But for that, the McLaren would have won.

Barcelona is a great measure of a car and McLaren was the faster one, which doesn’t bode well for Red Bull on home ground this weekend. Verstappen has won here six times, with three other podiums, so he can get the job done, given the chance.

Faltering Perez

Perez has scored eight points from his last four races in 2024, and his record here is modest. He has one podium finish, third place here last year. Perez has been told to get his finger out and start performing. We have heard that before, which begs the question, why did Red Bull extend his contract?

Perez seems to do this too often. He loses his confidence, goes missing for half the season, but the team stands by him. They can get away with it when they have a dominant car, but that luxury is no longer there.

With Mercedes now in the hunt for podiums, Ferrari strong on some tracks and McLaren right up there along with Verstappen, even an in-form Perez would find it difficult to finish on the podium. In his current form, a top 6 is a result. Verstappen is flying solo, and that is a strategic weakness.

Kerb Worries?

Watching Verstappen’s pole lap from last year, he rode no less than ten kerbs. We know that the Red Bull is unsettled by hitting kerbs, so will this be a problem? It may be, the cars are on these kerbs for over a second in some corners, but the kerbs here are not severe.

The track is used for bike racing and severe kerbs would be very dangerous for a bike to hit at high speed. I do not think it will be a defining factor, but it may still be something of a negative.

The team have admitted that the upgrades they introduced in Barcelona last weekend did not work. Verstappen is worried. He said that while he was happy to win last week, he didn’t have the fastest car.

The upgrades were not huge, but they didn’t do what the simulations said they should and that is another worry. A lack of correlation between the factory and the track is never a good sign. Will the next upgrades work as expected?

Wind Tunnel

I have to wonder that with Visa RB’s big upgrade at Barcelona being a huge flop, is there a problem at the Milton Keynes facility? Visa RB moved a lot of personnel from Italy to Milton Keynes over the winter, to have the two teams more closely integrated. With Visa RB using the same wind tunnel as Red Bull…is there a smoking gun there?

The wind tunnel in Bedford is old and there is a new one under construction. It won’t be ready until 2027, but has the old one thrown a cog?

Red Bull are not favourites in my book.

Ferrari 

Hanging on to second place in the Constructors’ Championship but losing ground. Sixty points behind Red Bull and just thirty three ahead of McLaren.

Since winning in Monaco, Ferrari have scored eighteen points in the last two races. Barcelona was a big test of where they stood in the pecking order, and it suggests that they are now the fourth best team, overtaken by Mercedes and behind McLaren and Red Bull.

The car has some good qualities, but the fact that their best track was Monaco, suggests that those qualities are not much use on these fast, purpose built racetracks.

Difficult Times

The two drivers hit each other on track and things have gone from great to difficult for Ferrari in quick time. We know how quickly things can unravel at Ferrari, and they are not optimistic that this track will be a good one for them.

Their Barcelona upgrade was a big one, designed to add downforce and reduce drag, a bit of a holy grail upgrade, but it didn’t really work. The car was bouncing in the fast corners. The drivers said it did work, but, if so, they are losing the development race.

Leclerc won here in 2022, in a sick car, and has been second three times, including last year. Sainz is yet to finish better than fifth from his eleven starts.

Indecisive Sainz

Carlos Sainz has still not made his mind up about who to sign with for 2025 and beyond. He admits that it is distracting from his performances and that he would like to make a decision as soon as possible, but he needs some time at home to think it through with his management. That is far from ideal.

Ferrari may have an OK race weekend, but that might mean another fifth and sixth, maybe a bit better for Leclerc. They should be strong at tracks like Baku and Singapore, but on these fast tracks with longer straights and long, faster corners, they are going to be less competitive than McLaren, Verstappen, and maybe even Mercedes.

McLaren 

The McLaren revival really kicked off here last year. They finally got their 2023 car on track for this race and Norris finished fifth but was promoted to fourth after a penalty for Sainz. That was the start of their climb from mediocrity, to now having the best car on the grid.

Norris is really looking forward to this race, and Silverstone next week, his two favourite tracks. Even in much less competitive machinery, Norris has performed very well on this track. He got his first podium here in 2020 (and got fastest lap).

Now, in very competitive machinery, he is looking like the favourite for the race on Sunday. With this being a Sprint race weekend, he has two bites at the Cherry, but he knows that it is Sunday that really counts.

Oscar Piastri will be getting a little concerned. He is now sixty three points behind Norris, and he has just the one podium finish, compared to Norris’ six in 2024. Piastri has only had the one race weekend here, he didn’t have the upgraded car last year, finishing back in sixteenth.

Mercedes 

Real progress has been made and that was confirmed by qualifying and finishing third and fourth in Barcelona last weekend. It looked like they might have been on for pole but ended up a couple of tenths off the pace and that pace carried through to the race. McLaren are improving enough to stay ahead and Verstappen has them at arm’s length, but they are now podium contenders.

Lewis Hamilton has won twice here, not great given his record elsewhere. He often struggled to beat his teammates here, losing out to Rosberg, Bottas and even Russell last year.

Hamilton is happier now he has a competitive car, and suddenly all the bullshit about never beating Russell qualifying again has stopped. Russell has a best result of 4th here, in 2022. He will be trying to be another awkward teammate at the Red Bull Ring for Hamilton.

Aston Martin 

It seems that Alonso has had enough of Aston Martin. He knows what is what and he knows that the team have lost the plot…. again.

His comments that the team need to work harder, talk less and deliver more, are not those of a happy man. He says he is expecting two more tough races on the back of a pointless weekend in Spain. He acknowledges that Barcelona exposed exactly where their car is. Just making Q3 will be a good result.

The team have an upgrade coming for Hungary, but for now, they are just trying to make the best of a bad job.

Visa RB 

From best of the bottom five and nudging the top five, to unbackable in one upgrade. It is very rare to see such a turnaround in form from one race to another. It wasn’t just a track specific hiccup, the big upgrade made the car slower. That is a lot of work and budget down the drain. It would be a surprise if they suddenly made it work just one week later.

The talk is once again of Ricciardo getting the boot at the end of the year and the atmosphere has suddenly soured at Visa RB. Ricciardo probably knows that his second chance is coming to an end. Suddenly, the VISA RB is very hard to fancy.

Alpine 

Things are looking up for Alpine. Some of it their own doing, some of it has just landed in their lap, but they will take it. The team picked up their second double points finish in a row in Spain and that suggests that they have made some progress, while the likes of Visa RB and Aston Martin have lost ground.

Gasly has just signed a new contract to stay with the team and they have signed up Flavio Briatore to sort out the management structure and bring a bit of F1 experience to the table. That will take time, but in the meantime the car is improving enough to take advantage of Aston Martin and Visa RB’s struggles.

Alpine have scored points here in the last two years, and they have a decent chance to do so again.

Haas 

Their early season form has dropped off and they have missed the chance to pick up more points, despite problems for Visa RB and Aston Martin. That is now five races without scoring any points, but Hulkenberg has finished eleventh for three of the last four, so he could inherit a point or two if he got some luck.

Williams 

In much the same boat as Haas. The wind has gone out of their sails and Barcelona exposed the car as being slow. More long duration corners at the Red Bull ring are not going to suit them. The car just lacks the downforce needed.

Kick Sauber 

Showed promise in free practice last weekend but come qualifying they were a bit disappointing. In the race, Bottas just went backwards, while Zhou made up a couple of places to finish thirteenth. That is where they seem to be. They have made some progress but are still behind the likes of Aston Martin and they have lost touch with Alpine. Another pointless weekend beckons.

2024 Austrian GP Summary

It seems strange that with 99% of the F1 pundits believing McLaren now have a slightly faster car, the betting markets make Max Verstappen the 1.57 favourite.

Max can’t keep being fortunate, Lando will string a few wins together, and on a track where he has gone well at in uncompetitive machinery, this could be the start. He should have won in Spain. Red Bull’s Helmut Marko says McLaren now have the faster car and that Max cannot keep on driving at 100% for every race.

Norris is performing very well, very consistently, but he is still new to this situation. He is not used to being the front runner. It can take some time to get that first win, and then become a consistent winning machine. He doesn’t have a big performance margin to help him, so he needs perfect execution.

On a track that he has always impressed at, one that he is looking forward to, he has a great chance to win this weekend.

2024 Austrian GP Tip: 3 points Lando Norris to win @ 4.00 with Ladbrokes, Betfred, BET365

Who could join Norris on the podium? Verstappen obviously. If he doesn’t win, he won’t be far away. Mercedes have had a driver on the podium for the last two races and back to back third and fourth places.

I have had the knack of backing the wrong Mercedes driver in the last two, but with Hamilton having a relatively poor record against teammates here (5-7), I’ll take Russell to get a podium.

2024 Austrian GP Tip: 1 point George Russell to finish on the podium @ 3.50 with Betfred, Betvictor.

With this being a Sprint Race weekend, there will be plenty of opportunities for further bets as the events unfold, so I will keep the rest of my powder dry for now.

-JamesPunt