The Spanish Grand Prix 2013 was the 5th round of the 2013 F1 season, and took place at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya in Montmeló, Spain, on May 12th.
Fernando Alonso won the race after starting in the 5th position, followed by Kimi Räikkönen, and Felipe Massa completing the podium.
Nico Rosberg started from the pole position, but only managed to finish 6th.
Final results
Race evolution
Pit Stops
There were a total of 79 pit stops during the race.
The most popular pit stop windows were:
- Laps 7-11: 18 stops
- Laps 19-30: 21 stops
- Laps 34-39: 15 stops
- Laps 45-47: 5 stops
- Laps 49-51: 8 stops
- Laps 53-54: 4 stops
The fastest pit stop was Pastor Maldonado's, stopping the clock at 13.266 seconds during his pit stop on lap 13, while the slowest one was was Adrian Sutil's, who stopped the clock at 1 minutes, 14.026 seconds, 1 minutes, 0.760 seconds slower than Maldonado, during his pit stop on lap 8.
These times include the time the driver spent going through the pit lane, as well as the actual time he stopped for the mechanics to work on his car.
Strategy
The race was not obvious in terms of pit stop strategy, with different teams and different drivers choosing to make anywhere from 2 to 6 stops.
The race winner, Fernando Alonso, was on a 4 stops strategy.
2 stops
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3Giedo van der Garde
3 stops
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5Charles Pic
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-Valtteri Bottas
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5Nico Rosberg
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2Kimi Räikkönen
-
6Jenson Button
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2Max Chilton
4 stops
-
2Jules Bianchi
-
2Mark Webber
-
6Felipe Massa
-
-Adrian Sutil
-
4Fernando Alonso
-
10Lewis Hamilton
-
3Paul di Resta
-
8Jean-Éric Vergne
-
1Sebastian Vettel
-
1Sergio Pérez
-
1Daniel Ricciardo
-
8Esteban Gutiérrez
5 stops
-
3Pastor Maldonado
6 stops
-
-Nico Hülkenberg
Excluding those drivers who could not finish the race, those on a 3 stops strategy gained 1.67 positions on average, the ones on a 4 stops strategy gained 1.27 positions on average, the ones on a 5 stops strategy gained 3 positions on average, while those on a 6 stops strategy didn't gain or lose any positions on average.
Despite of the average possitons gained or lost, and considering a deeper analysis of the performance of each strategy, we consider the 4 stops strategy as the optimal for this race.
It is important to note that this might not always be the case for other races held at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, as the conditions might change from year to year, in terms of wheel degradation, accidents, safety cars, etc.
Incidents
There race went on mostly with no incidents. Only 3 divers were involved in circumstances that were severe enough to prevented them from finishing the race.
These included, Jean-Éric Vergne, who had to retire due to an accident on lap 52, Giedo van der Garde, who had a wheel problem on lap 21, and Romain Grosjean, who suffered a suspension problem on lap 8.
Accident
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Jean-Éric VergneLap 52
Wheel
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Giedo van der GardeLap 21
Suspension
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Romain GrosjeanLap 8
Qualifying
Nico Rosberg managed to get the pole position by 0.254 seconds and a final lipe time of 1:20.718. Lewis Hamilton was right behind him, helping Mercedes score a one-two and monopolize the first line of the grid.
Track evolution
As the qualifying session went on, with the track rubbering in, and the drivers testing the limits of the grip of their cars, the times per lap dropped, and all of the drivers that took place in Q2 improved their times in this second session.
The Q3 is the time were all the remaining drivers put all their cards on the table, even those with a superior car who might have been managing their times in Q1 and Q2 push their cars to the limit in Q3. It therefore comes as no surprise that 8 out of the 10 drivers that took place in Q3 were able to improve their times.