As F1 returns from a three-week break, Hamilton could become the driver to have led the title race on the most occasions and Alonso makes his 100th start with number 14. Here are the milestones and records which could be broken at the 2021 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix!
THE MILESTONES
This will be the 1,037th World Championship Formula 1 race. It will be the second running of the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix and the 29th World Championship race to take place at Imola.
This will be the 101st Formula 1 race held in Italy, making the country the first to have held more than 100 races. Read more: Countries Which Have Hosted the Most F1 Races.
This will be the 100th race in which Fernando Alonso has appeared as the driver of car number 14.
This will be the third race to be held on 18th April. It’s the first race to be held on this date since the 2010 Chinese Grand Prix.
Lap 43 of the 2021 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix will be the 1750th lap to take place at Imola in Formula 1 history.
The 2021 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix takes place three weeks after the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix. It makes the 2021 F1 season the first since 2007 to feature a three week gap between the first two races of the year.
Come race day, 168 days will have passed since the 2020 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix. That makes this the shortest gap between two F1 races held at Imola, beating the previous record of 231 days between the 1980 Italian Grand Prix and the 1981 San Marino Grand Prix.
THE RECORDS TO BREAK
If Lewis Hamilton takes victory in the 2021 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, he will become the seventh driver to have taken multiple victories at Imola and fifth to have won at the circuit in consecutive seasons. Fernando Alonso could also become the seventh driver to have taken multiple wins here.
If Lewis Hamilton wins this race, it will be the nineteenth time that a driver has won the first two races of the season. It will be the first time it has happened since Sebastian Vettel won the 2018 Australian and Bahrain Grands Prix.
Should Lewis Hamilton remain in the lead of the Drivers’ Championship after the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, he would equal Michael Schumacher as the driver to have led the championship on the most occasions. Schumacher led the title after 121 Grands Prix during his career – a number which Hamilton will equal if he leads after the Imola race.
If anyone other than Hamilton or Alonso wins the race, they will become the sixteenth driver to have taken a victory at Imola.
At the Bahrain Grand Prix, Lewis Hamilton, Valtteri Bottas and Max Verstappen equalled the record for the most common podium trio in Formula 1. If they finish together on the podium again this weekend, it would be the fifteenth time they have done so: a new record for the most common trio. The record is currently shared between this trio and Hamilton, Nico Rosberg and Sebastian Vettel.
If Valtteri Bottas or Kimi Raikkonen win the 2020 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, they would become the first Finnish driver to win a Formula 1 race held in Italy.
Williams and Ferrari are currently tied for most team victories at the track. A win for either team would see them extend the record of most wins here to nine, while Mercedes could become the fifth team to have taken multiple wins at the circuit.
Kimi Raikkonen and Valtteri Bottas are the only drivers on the grid to have previously taken pole position at Imola. Should any non-Finnish driver take pole this weekend, they would become the fourteenth driver to start from pole at the track.
Mercedes will become the first team to see both cars reach Q3 at 50 consecutive races if both Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas qualify in the top ten at the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix. The last time a Mercedes car failed to reach Q3 was at the 2018 German Grand Prix.
Should the driver starting from second on the grid win the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, this will be the 250th World Championship race won by the driver starting from second. Only polesitters have won more races, with 435 Grands Prix having been won from pole.
Should two British drivers finish on the podium at the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, the nation would become the first to have recorded 700 top three results in Formula 1’s history.
If Kimi Raikkonen scores, he will become only the second driver to have a gap of over twenty years between his first and last points-scoring Grands Prix. Michael Schumacher is the only other driver who has achieved this.
A points-scoring finish for Sebastian Vettel would make him only the sixth driver to have scored points in fifteen consecutive seasons.
A pole position for Valtteri Bottas would be his seventeenth pole in Formula 1. Should he achieve it, he would move ahead of Stirling Moss and Felipe Massa on the list of non-World Champions with the most pole positions. Only Rene Arnoux, who took eighteen poles in his career, would remain ahead of the Finn.
If Kimi Raikkonen or Valtteri Bottas lead a lap, Finland will become the fifth nation to have had a driver lead in at least 200 Grands Prix. Meanwhile, should Daniel Ricciardo lead a lap, this will be the 100th Grand Prix in which an Australian driver has led a lap.
