Lapping the Red Bull Ring with Jak Crawford

The shortest circuit on the Formula 1 calendar in terms of lap time, and the one with the fewest corners, is also a venue that often sees great racing and drivers bemoaning costly errors. Ahead of his latest FP1 outing for Aston Martin, third driver Jak Crawford is your guide for a lap of the Red Bull Ring in Austria.

Jak Crawford. Alastair Staley/Getty Images

It's a short lap, but I think it's a really nice track because it has a bit of everything, even though it's so short and so simple. It has slow-speed and high-speed corners where you need to be, one, good on the brakes, and then two, you need to be brave in the high speed, so it's quite a good circuit.

I think the most challenging part is always the tight margins and trying to find that extra tenth where it really, really matters at this track.

In the past we've had a lot of issues with track limits, especially in the high-speed corners where it's just super hard to be precise, but it's also such a big lap time gainer. They made some good renovations, I'd say, in the last two years with some gravel strips on the exit of Turn 9 and 10. I will say it brings a lot more gravel on the track, but it definitely helps with track limits.

You need a lot of downforce, really, even though there's a lot of straights. You need good power and mainly good downforce. It's one of the tracks where we're kind of at a little bit of altitude and that means you lose a bit of downforce, so you want maximum downforce. At the end of the day, Sector 3 is the most crucial one for the lap – so all the high-speed stuff at the end of the lap – so if you're strong there, you'll have a strong outcome.

I feel like I see Turn 9 and 10 as kind of one, so it's kind of a rhythm section. You just need a good rhythm. It's how you want to carry the speed into Turn 9. Obviously, not run too wide, but you want to have the car in a good position to enter well in Turn 10, which again is quite a crucial corner for a good exit. It's all about the rhythm and just having a good flow.

You've gotta go with the flow but also know your limits at the Red Bull Ring. Guenther Iby/SEPA.Media/Getty Images

It’s going to be very hot this weekend and tires will overheat. Normally, we run quite soft compounds here. So here we have the C5, which is the softest compound we have. For sure, they'll struggle a bit. That's why Sector 3 as well is so crucial because you have the tires falling off there.

In the first Sector it'll be quite interesting, I think, with this super clip and energy stuff. It'll be a lot slower into Turn 3, for sure, which means we can probably brake really late, probably later than we have the last couple of years. It will be super interesting there, and then you have the opposite at Turn 4 where it goes a bit downhill, so you'll still want that assistance to slow down.

I think the challenge is just trying to really maximize every lap, because with only six or seven real corners, that means if you make a mistake, then it's really going to cost you. It's a challenging track from that perspective, but it's quite fun. I think the racing as well is quite good at this track. You don’t always have this many opportunities to pass, as we'll see on Sunday, I think.

Schedule (all times ET):

Friday, June 26

Practice 1, 7:30 - 8:30am

Practice 2, 11:00am - 12:00pm

Saturday, June 27

Practice 3, 6:30 - 7:30am

Qualifying, 10:00 - 11:00am

Sunday, June 28

Race, 9:00-11:00am