For Carlos Sainz, the Madring's first Formula 1 weekend was supposed to be a homecoming of sorts. Instead, by the time the chequered flag fell on the inaugural event, the local hero found himself cast as the supreme architect of everybody’s misery – both for the asphalt beneath their tyres and the chaos upon it.
The Williams driver had been closely associated with the city's new Grand Prix project, serving as an ambassador for a circuit intended to give the Spanish capital its own place in the sport's calendar.
But as the dust settled on the Madring’s inaugural Spanish Grand Prix, Sainz found himself attached to rather less flattering aspects of the occasion.
The new venue was already being questioned over its inability to produce meaningful overtaking, while the man who had helped promote it was also at the centre of one of the weekend's more contentious incidents.
'We need to criticize Carlos'
The first charge came from Sky F1 consultant Nico Rosberg, who could hardly resist pointing out the awkward connection between Sainz and a circuit that had left F1 fans with a decidedly underwhelming spectacle.
The 2016 world champion believes the layout will need surgery before the Madring returns next year — and, with Sainz having served as its ambassador, he knew exactly where to direct some of the blame.
“Carlos Sainz was the ambassador, so we need to criticise Carlos Sainz,” Rosberg said.
“They need to revisit the track layout for next year and create one good overtaking opportunity. We need that on this track because it's just too hard to overtake.”
Rosberg's jibe had a playful edge, but the criticism behind it was serious. Antonelli's triumph did little to disguise a race in which overtaking proved painfully difficult, with the Madring's narrow, unforgiving sequences repeatedly turning faster cars into frustrated followers.
“It was pretty shocking. Piastri on Colapinto, for example. Piastri had fresh tyres, he could not get past. And he was so much quicker. It's just super hard to overtake,” Rosberg added.
For the organisers, that was hardly an ideal verdict on their brand-new creation. For Sainz, it carried an added sting.
Having lent his name and profile to the project, he could scarcely have imagined that one of the circuit's earliest public diagnoses would come with his own name attached to the punchline.
Then came the Alonso affair
If endorsing a procession wasn't enough to earn the crowd's side-eye, Sainz ensured his on-track antics matched the general frustration.
The pre-race pretense of camaraderie between Spain's two favorite sons evaporated completely on lap 14. Fernando Alonso, angling for 17th place, attempted to get a run on the right-hand side heading into the Turn 5 chicane.
Sainz, adhering strictly to his own spatial logic, drifted right to cover the line, squeezing the Aston Martin directly toward the concrete barriers. The resulting touch shaved the front-wing endplate right off Alonso’s car.
Having already survived a lap-one tangle with Yuki Tsunoda’s Racing Bulls machine – a squeeze near Turn 1 that stewards dutifully brushed off as a mere racing incident – Sainz found his luck running out with the stewards, who promptly handed him a five-second penalty for his defense against Alonso.
Fernando Alonso and Carlos Sainz meet King Felipe of Spain and his daughters.
Unsurprisingly, Alonso wasted no time weaponizing the team radio to make sure race control felt the full weight of his indignation.
"At the start, he crashed into two people," fulminated Alonso. "Now he squeezed me into the wall in the braking."
Read also:
Team Talk: A very first Sunday at the Madring
Sainz, who retired prematurely after floor damage from his opening-lap contact proved terminal, was less than impressed by his elder countryman's theatrical flair for lobbying the officials.
"It's the nature of that corner when you turn right and I think he complained on the radio so he managed to get me a penalty like always," said Sainz afterwards.
"I think it's the nature of that corner is always going to lead to this kind of crashes because there's only space for one, there's not even space for two – and you cannot keep looking in your mirror while you're turning and doing a right-left because you need to look forward, so at one point you need to focus on your own driving line."
"I don't think Fernando was alongside me or anything."
Alonso, who eventually trundled home in 17th place and two laps down, accepted the stewards' intervention with the calm satisfaction of a veteran who knew his radio work had paid off.
"If they [the stewards] consider that [penalty] enough, it's good for me," said Alonso. "We didn't finish any of the two in the points, but I think that was unnecessary. There was plenty of room on the left."
When the engine fumes finally cleared over IFEMA, Sainz was left with an ambassadorial legacy of a track nobody could pass on, a ruined race car, a penalty point, and an irritated Fernando Alonso.
All in all, a remarkably efficient day's work at the office.
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