After the Spa Grand Prix in Belgium, F1 completely entered the summer break. Almost the entire August is the only time of the year for drivers to take a break.
(one)
Speaking of Spa-Francorchamps, the circuit has been around for quite some time, even before it was added to the Formula 1 calendar in the 1950s. Nestled in the unpredictable Ardennes Forest, it's renowned for its high-speed corners. Its puzzling names are inspired by the local area. The most famous corner, Eau Rouge (Red River Bend), is named after the river that flows beneath the track. The water is indeed red, a result of the iron oxide minerals beneath. The tongue-twisting Spa-Francorchamps is the name of the spa town where the track is located.
French driver Pierre Gasly of the Alpine team competes in Budapest, Hungary from July 31 to August 4, 2025, local time.
Spa has long been a favorite circuit for French driver Gasly, and Eau Rouge is a beautiful corner of his heart. Gasly described it this way in an interview: "Looking back, you can see the parking lot, the first corner, the stands, and the different fan areas. If you turn around, you can see the Kemmel straight, which goes deep into the woods."
It was at Spa-Francorchamps that Gasly secured his first Formula One victory. I wonder if this deepened the significance of this circuit for him. All the great racing drivers in history have left their mark here: Schumacher, Senna... For a century, people have experienced the same rhythm of this old-fashioned track, undulating and swaying along the slopes.
Yet, none of this is apparent on television. If we were to vote for the most boring F1 tracks, just like we vote for the best driver of the day, Spa-Francorchamps would undoubtedly be in the top three. Even so, people still have something to say about this track, and they never tire of talking about it.
(two)
They say the more beautiful something is, the more dangerous it is. At Spa-Francorchamps, with a 65% accident rate, people often say that if you run off the track, you don't know what you'll hit. A more accurate statement is that if you lose control at the beautiful Eau Rouge and Radillon combination, it's hard to say you'll emerge alive. In 2019, Formula 2 driver Anthony Hubert lost control at the Eau Rouge and Radillon combination and was split in two by a following car.
Before him, 47 drivers had died here.
Since then, Gasly has had mixed feelings about the circuit.
Hubert is Gasly's best friend. "The fastest kid in France," Gasly has called him since they met at the FAS academy at the age of 13. Entering F1 was their shared and sole childhood goal. In 2019, they were the same age, but after the summer, only Hubert remained 23 forever. Gasly said it felt like he had lost a part of himself.
July 27, 2025, local time, Spa-Francorchamps Circuit, Belgium, 2025 F1 Belgian Grand Prix.
(three)
Spa wasn't always the last race before the summer break. Until at least 2023, the end of summer was marked by the Hungaroring in Hungary. At least in 2019, Spa was still the first race after the summer break. For all the drivers at the time, Spa meant a restart. And then, only Gasly was stuck.
In fact, something else happened in the summer of 2019. Gasly returned to Toro Rosso. Toro Rosso is Red Bull's second team in F1 and is also a mid-field team. In 2017, Gasly entered F1 through Toro Rosso and was promoted to Red Bull two years later, replacing Ricciardo as Verstappen's teammate. Although there are ten teams and twenty drivers in F1, your teammate is always the first person you have to defeat. However, being a teammate with a genius is always like a "curse". It is impossible not to live in his shadow and be a second-rate driver. In all the races before the summer break, Gasly had never surpassed Verstappen in even a single race. In terms of numbers, before the start of Spa, the difference between them was 118 points.
So, Red Bull dropped Gasly. This was Dr. Marko's usual style: drivers who didn't meet expectations weren't worthy of staying at Red Bull. Gasly was on vacation in Spain when he received the demotion order. The time was 8:42 a.m., and Gasly always remembered it.
Later, as word spread quickly around the paddock and beyond, Gasly received a text message from Hubert that read, "Prove them wrong. Stay strong bro."
At the end of the summer break, Gasly returned to the paddock and put on the Red Bull jersey again. However, no one knew at the time that Gasly, who had lost his seat in the big team, would soon lose Hubert as well.
(Four)
When Gasly won the championship in Monza, Italy in 2020, the moment most recorded by the camera was not the moment he stood on the podium and held up the trophy, nor was it the moment he sprayed champagne on the team below the stage, but the moment he sat alone next to the trophy on the podium with ribbons falling to the ground, with his head down.
On September 6, 2020 local time, Pierre Gasly won the 2020 F1 Grand Prix Italian Grand Prix.
Scenes like this are rare. After celebrating with the fans, the podium drivers dispersed, disappearing from view. There were no spectators at that race, or rather, the F1 races, which had been largely quieter for the entire year, were quieter due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Away from the crowds, Gasly had ample time to relax and unwind.
As a bystander, watching Gasly from afar, I often imagine him wandering alone, endlessly in endless silence. Losing either a dream or a close friend can be devastating, and Gasly experienced both at the age of 23. Back then, he needed a victory more than anyone else.
Baron Pierre de Coubertin said, "What counts in life is not victory but the struggle. What is essential to life is not the victory but the having fought without regret."
In 2020, a year after Hubert's death, Gasly told reporters in Spa, "I always come back here with good memories of the different victories I won here. This year it's different. As soon as I step in here, those images come to mind, things that I don't want to accept or find difficult to accept."
This year he said: "I am trying to turn those strange feelings, those sadness, into a 'force for positivity'."
No matter what, Gasly will continue to walk and fight like this in the future.
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