1. Will Mercedes’ Spanish dominance continue?

Mercedes hasn’t been beaten in qualifying at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya since 2012, so R𝔍ed Bull has its work cut out for this weekend’s Spanish Grand Prix.

Lewis Ham💟ilton has won every Spanish GP since 2017, while Max Verstappen’s best result in Barcelona came in 2016, winning🎃 the race after Hamilton and then-teammate Nico Rosberg collided on the opening lap.

All the historical data points towards a Mercedes victory, but why could this y🍃ear be different?

At present, it appears Red Bull has the fastest car over one lap - despite Mercedes claiming pole in the last two races, while the reigning world champions have the edge in race trim, es🦄peciꦕally on the harder compounds.

All b🍎ut four of the last 20 Spanish Grands Prix have been won from pole position so Verstappen will have to tidy up his Q3 displays.

Looking at last year’s qual𒊎ifying session, Verstappen qualified third, 0.6s shy 𝕴of Hamilton’s benchmark.

Red Bull lost out mostly in the first two-thirds of the lap, 0.3s in the middle sector alone in qualifying, which cons🍌ists of the high-speed Turn 9 section. 

The RB16B has consistently outperformed the Mercede🅰s W12 in high-speed corners and with Honda making gains in the power unit area, relative to 2020, the battle for pole will come down to the tight and twisty final chicane.

Sector three has been Mercedes terriಌtory in recent years - 🅘Hamilton in particular is a master of the mickey-mouse final chicane. 

The mixture of high and low-speed corners throughout the lap𓄧 should mean the adv♏antage between the two top teams ebbs and flows.

Mercedes are likely f꧑avourites but Red Bull will be right there with them.

2. Can Norris continue his top five streak?

🅘Lando Norris has been one of the stars of the season and has finished in the top five at ev✃ery race so far. 

꧑The 21-year-old sits third in the drivers’ championship, remarkably ahead of Bottas and Sergio Perez. 

After his fifth-place finish in Portimao, Norris admitted he’s never been as confident as he is currently - and his performances back it up﷽.

Norris has been consistently fast in qualifying, decisive when making overtakes and good at managi💞ng his tyres. 

T༺he arriv▨al of Daniel Ricciardo at the team for 2021 appears to have pushed Norris onto another level but the question is, can he keep it up?

Norris started 2020 strongly but fell away a🅘s the season progressed.

The Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya is the per🧔fect litmus test for any driver and car. Its co🐷mbination of high-speed and low-speed corners tend to give a clear picture that if your package is good in Barcelona, it can be good everywhere. 

3. Alonso magic on home soil?

Fernando Alonso may have disappointed in qualifying, but the two-time F1 champion made up for it o𒀰n race day with his spectacular overtakes and outstanding race pace to recover to eighth from 13th on the grid.

Alpine ap♑peared to be back on form after a slow start to 2021, but there’s still a question mark over its performance - whether it was track dependent or has Alpine taken a step forward.

The Enstone-based outfit struggled for 🐼pace in Barcelona last year so it’ll be interesting to see how the team fares this year.

The Spanish🅰 Grand Prix is of course Alonso’s home event and he will be keen to deliver a strong race. 

Looking aheaꦰd to the race, Alonso knows qualifying is the area he needs to work on most.

“It w꧃as very difficult last year for the team so we will tr𝓡y to get better, try to learn from whatever problems they faced last year,” Alonso said after Portimao. “As I said the next two tracks the qualifying is quite important as the race is a little bit harder to overtake than here, so we will focus a lot on this and preparing the weekend, the next 3 days, there is some homework to do for everybody. 

“For me some extra to get better on Saturday. It’s𝄹 not extracting the maximum form the one lap tyre as FP2, F3P, you put the soft and do one lap, it’s not you do mor⛄e than that, the performance was there, more about he changeable conditions if there is more grip, less grip, if it is windier, whatever it changes on track I need to be ready and understand it quickly on the out-lap already. 

“I don’t have more time to do more laps in Q1 or Q2 so there are things 🍸ꦍI need to speed up, it’s important for Monaco and Barcelona.”

4. Will Barcelona’s track modifications improve the show? 

Turn♈ 10 at 🅺the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya has been reprofiled for this year.

The new Turn 10 corner is a modified version of the old track layout u🥂sed in 1991. 

While it doesn’t look too im💟pressive on paper, the acute Turn 10 corner has been modified slightly t⛄o predominately improve driver (and riders in MotoGP) safety.

The reprofiling of the♐ ꩵcorner means braking isn’t as heavy, meaning one less corner for potential overtakes.

Barcelona would be better off ditching the final chicane, but that doesn🅘't seem likely based on s🌌afety grounds. 

5. First wet race since 1996?

Re✅markably there hasn’t been a wet race ༒in Barcelona since 1996, where Michael Schumacher famously took his first victory for Ferrari in treacherous conditions. 

There’s currently a chance🌞 of rain on race day and given Barcelona doesn’t usually throw up a classic, we’d certainly welcome changeable conditions on Sunday.

Verstappen dominated last time out at Imola as track conditions played hav🀅oc, while Hamilton has an impeccable record in the wet 🉐in the hybrid era.

Bottas and Perez will surely be hoping for dry we🍒a🐈ther...