A race in my words: Dennis Hauger

10 August 2022

It remains a stand out moment in motorsport history and Dennis Hauger has vivid memories of watching the 2021 Formula 1 finale from Abu Dhabi last year.

The PREMA Racing driver was already there preparing for the post-season tests and so was in attendance for Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen's showdown, a race that will live in the memory of fans around the world.

“The race that I enjoyed the most was one that I watched live, Abu Dhabi last year. That was pretty cool. Other than racing myself, I don't watch races all the time but when you're there on the weekend, it's cool to see the F1. I think that was one of the more exciting ones with all crowd going crazy. That was an epic moment and was cool to be there for.

“I was watching it in the PREMA lounge, watching with the team. It was quite cool because we could see the backstraight during the fight on the last lap. Getting to see everything was pretty cool.

"Everything built up because when I was on the plane on my way to Abu Dhabi, there were British guys and there was Dutch people everywhere. You could just see the whole thing and what was going on, what was about to happen. It was cool to be a part of that.

"During the race, I was actually quite chilled because it looked like Hamilton was going to win really easily. Then suddenly a Safety Car came out and they pitted Max and we still didn't think he would be able to get through the field and the backmarkers passed them and they were suddenly together.

“We're like, ‘Oh, that happened!' It was quite exciting. Especially with (Sergio) Perez involved trying to hold Hamilton up and using quite a few tactical things going on. I think that it was a pretty unique weekend overall.

“I was watching the screens and we could easily see how much Perez was backing off. He actually managed to hold Hamilton off for quite a long time on the old tyres, which was quite cool. But that was still not going to be enough to get really close to Hamilton for Max, obviously it was the Safety Car that helped the most.

"When the Safety Car came out I knew Max was going have it after the lapped cars passed. On his new soft tyres, going all in for one push lap, I just remember thinking I wanted to drive that lap myself.”