Kimi Raikkonen (P18): 3.5/10
It was too cold for ice creams in Spa this weekend, but otherwise there seemed to be an all-too familiar level of disinterest in proceedings for Kimi Raikkonen. He had an embarrassing encounter with the wall at pit entry during first practice which cost him track time and seemed to take the wind out of his sails for what followed, and a brake issue meant he missed most of final practice which left him ill-prepared for the conditions in qualifying. The result was the ignominy of being out-done in qualifying by a Haas on his way to emphatically missing the cut in Q1. Worried about the car's handling, the Alfa Romeo mechanics decided to change his downforce configuration before the start of the race even though it was under parc ferme conditions and incurred a pit lane start, although that was only a net cost of one place for the start that never happened. Very much a weekend to forget for F1's most experienced veteran star and former champion.
Nikita Mazepin (P17): 5.5/10
Nikita Mazepin finally got a new chassis this weekend after months of complaining that his first one was heavier than that of his Haas team mate Mick Schumacher. It didn't seem to make much difference, but then again this was hardly the weekend for an objective analysis of such subtleties. That said, he was faster than Schumacher in both of Friday's practice sessions, even if things were back in their right order on Saturday. Mazepin avoided starting the race from dead last when he was bumped from the bottom by Lance Stroll serving a penalty, and then by Kimi Raikkonen and Sergio Perez starting from pit lane due to work done on their cars under parc ferme conditions. Technically, Mazepin finished the 'race' with the fastest lap on the board, but there was no bonus point (as he was outside the top ten) and it was not even officially recorded as it was statistically irrelevant in a race consisting of just one lap behind the safety car; but it'll make for a good dinner party anecdote in Moscow in a couple of decades.
