Hakkinen: Jeddah high speed means risk and more accidents

The frightfully fast, high-speed Jeddah Circuit hosts Round 2 of the 2024 F1 World Championship, hot on the heels of the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix.

The Jeddah circuit is very different to the desert-based Sakhir Circuit, the SaudiGP venue with its walls and blind sweeps is another kettle of fish, as cars are flat-out 250km plus top speed makes it the fastest street track ever.

Writing in his Unibet column ahead of the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix weekend, Hakkinen reasoned: "Anyone who knows me realises I liked to have a ‘flat out’ mentality, and the Jeddah circuit is like that. Flat out, a maximum speed of around 330kph.

"Speed means risk and increased risk means that accidents happen and cars can suffer failures," warned Hakkinen, a winner of 20 Grand Prix races, with a fair share of massive shunts on his F1 resume.

The 55-year-old, fondly named the Flying Finn continued: "Based on the previous Grands Prix held on this circuit a Safety Car is certain. We have even had two red flags in previous years, so we need to expect incidents, accidents and unpredictability.

"The teams plan for that, they simulate not only the perfect race but also the incidents that can occur, from safety cars to bad pit stops and the impact of any damage," Hakkinen predicted.

Records show Mika won his two F1 titles driving for McLaren powered by Mercedes. Perhaps armed with inside info, he goes against the grain predicting: "We will see a stronger race performance in Jeddah from Mercedes.

"They lost a lot of lap time in Bahrain because they had to increase the cooling on their cars, something which also affected two Mercedes-powered Williams," observed Hakkinen, of a night of near-freezing temperatures at Sakhir, surrounded by desert, suggesting the German manufacturer has work to do.

Regarding Lewis Hamilton's final year with Mercedes, Hakkinen weighed in: "Lewis took pole position and won the first Saudi Arabian Grand Prix back in 2021. While we fully expect Red Bull to remain at the front, watch out for Mercedes as they unlock more race speed and take the fight to Ferrari.

"The great news for Lewis and teammate George Russell is that their new car is much more predictable to drive, a good step forward after the disappointments of the last two years," added Hakkinen, whose words will be judged starting today from FP1 in Jeddah.

Mick Schumacher suffered a high-impact, 33G crash in qualifying for the 2022 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix (pictured at the top) in Jeddah. Having made it out of Q1, Schumacher was on a hot lap in Q2 when he clouted the kerbs at Turn 10, slamming into the wall and sliding down the track before coming to a rest.

Schumacher was airlifted to the local hospital for precautionary checks – while his team later confirmed that the German wouldn’t take the start of the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, with his Haas VF-22 having suffered heavy damage in the impact.