by Linus O'Howell
Since 2009, Formula 1 has visited Abu Dhabi late in the season and it’s fair to say that the Yas Marina Circuit divides opinions among fans and drivers. However, there’s no doubt that there has been some iconic moments over the years in the UAE and in this article, I will go over five of them.
4-Way Title Fight (2010)
📸 Petrov's stout defence denied Alonso a third world championship.
Whilst we may not have a championship fight on are hands heading into this weekend’s finale, the same could not be said for the 2010 Season Finale as Fernando Alonso, Mark Webber, Sebastian Vettel, and Lewis Hamilton all entered the weekend with a mathematical chance of clinching the Drivers’ Championship. Alonso was in the best position in his Ferrari, leading the standings by 10 points, but he was famously 'cost' the World Championship due to being unable to overtake the Renault of Vitaly Petrov, an incident that ultimately led to DRS being introduced.
Webber, who was the second favourite for the championshi, ended up finishing behind Petrov and Alonso in P8, and in the end, a victory for Vettel was enough for Vettel to become the youngest ever Formula 1 world champion at just 23 years of age.
Multiple Driver Farewells
📸 As Fernando Alonso called time on his F1 career(at the time), he was joined by Sebastian Vettel and Lewis Hamilton on the main straight for some farewell doughnuts. No, not that kind.
Due to Abu Dhabi usually being the final race of the season, it has meant that plenty of drivers have bowed out of the sport at the Yas Marina Circuit. The likes of Sebastian Vettel, Kimi Raikkonen, and Felipe Massa have all retired over the years in Abu Dhabi whilst Fernando Alonso, Jenson Button, and Robert Kubica all saw their first goodbyes from F1 take place around this circuit (before they eventually came back). There was also one other guy in particular that ended up having his last race at Yas Marina in 2016, but we weren’t to know at the time. Speaking of...
Nico Rosberg’s Crowning Moment (2016)
📸 Shortly after this picture, Rosberg made it to his home planet: at least, we think.
After Lewis Hamilton beat his Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg to the 2014 World Drivers’ Championship in the Season Finale before a comfortable third world title arrived in 2015, Rosberg was out for revenge in the 2016 finale. Heading into the final round of the season, Rosberg had a 12-point gap over his British teammate and he knew that a podium finish would be enough for him to seal the crown.
Near the end of the race, Lewis led to Nico in another Mercedes 1-2 and it became clear to Hamilton that he needed to back his teammate into the cars behind if wanted any chance of becoming champion, much to the annoyance of his team. Despite this, Rosberg was able to hold off the Ferrari of Sebastian Vettel and the Red Bull of Max Verstappen to take home a quite memorable championship victory in what ended up being his final race in the sport.
The Brand-New Layout
📸 The view over the revamped, faster hairpin.
After years of drivers struggling to overtake around the Yas Marina Circuit, the circuit designers decided to make a few changes in order to create better racing. Some of those changes included getting rid of the slow, horrible 4-5-6 chicane in order to make it one long hairpin, removing the Turns 11-14 chicane at the start of Sector 3 in order to have one long corner, and also making the corners around the 'W Abu Dhabi Hotel' wider in order for drivers to carry more speed.
From my experience of playing the F1 games as well as watching the races over the years, I definetly feel that this changes are an improvement. However, you could argue that the original Turn 11-14 chicane was actually the best overtaking spot on the track.
The Final Lap Shootout (2021)
📸 Hamilton leads Verstappen before the Dutchman made a deciding move.
The 2021 Formula 1 season is widely regarded as one of, if not the greatest Formula 1 season of all time. The culmination of the season in Abu Dhabi should also have been that as Red Bull’s Max Verstappen and Mercedes’ 7-time World Champion Lewis Hamilton headed into the final weekend level on points.
For most of the race (certainly after the controversy on the opening lap ), Hamilton looked certain to become an 8-time World Champ, but that all changed on Lap 53 as Nicolas Latifi found the wall in his Williams. This brought out the Safety Car and it looked for all the world like the race and the season were going to end with Bernd Mayländer at the front.
However, on the penultimate lap, Race Director Michael Masi made the decision to let the five lapped cars between Hamilton and Verstappen go before he brought the Safety Car into the pits. This meant we got a final lap shootout for the championship, and thanks in part to the fresher tyres, Max Verstappen was able to pull off a super move to overtake Lewis Hamilton before he crossed the line to become a World Champion (for the first time) in one of the most dramatic sporting moments of all time.
Think of any more icomic Abu Dhabi Grand Prix moments? Let us know down in the comments!
📸 Image credits: Sky Sports, Formula Motorsport Limited.
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