The Formula 1 Japanese GP, held this Sunday (29), ended with a lower-than-expected result for Gabriel Bortoleto. The Audi driver crossed the finish line in 13th place at the Suzuka Circuit, staying out of the points zone for the second consecutive race. Check out how the race went for the Brazilian:
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Lights out and Bortoleto started on medium tires. The Brazilian started from ninth position and lost ground, falling to 13th, behind Liam Lawson of Racing Bulls.
The two swapped positions in the following laps, but the New Zealander managed to “strike back” and jump to 13th. As a result, Franco Colapinto (Alpine) and Ollie Bearman (Haas) also overtook Bortoleto, who was in 15th position on lap 3. Over the radio, he reported a lack of grip on the track.
On lap 7, Bortoleto managed to regain 14th position by overtaking Bearman. Then, he began to look for pace to catch Colapinto.
On lap 22, Bearman crashed and the Safety Car was deployed. At this moment, due to the pit stop window, Bortoleto was in 10th place, having not yet made his tire change. On the following lap, Audi called the Brazilian in to put on hard tires. He returned in 11th.
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The race resumed on lap 28, but Gabriel lost two positions, one of them to teammate Nico Hülkenberg. However, the Brazilian managed to return to 11th place shortly after.
The race entered its final phase, with 40 laps completed. In 13th, Bortoleto was more than 1s behind Hulkenberg.
The Brazilian even managed to get close to 12th place, which ended up in the hands of Isack Hadjar (Red Bull), but he lacked pace and took the checkered flag in 13th, without scoring points for the second consecutive race. He finished 59 seconds behind the winner, Kimi Antonelli of Mercedes.
Now, F1 will go a month without races, as the rounds in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia were canceled due to the conflict affecting the Middle East. The next race is the Miami GP on May 3rd.
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