Once the dust had settled after the Monaco GP (Round 6) it appeared clear that the Championship would be fought between reigning world champion Petri Saukkonen, and Prince Avogadro who was now entering only his third year. Backed by a powerful Cuzata team who won the opening race at Kyalami with team mate Cassandra Ouellet, the Prince then won at Suzuka and Monte Carlo, taking the lead of the championship after both events.

Saukkonen on the other hand had a slow start; the Furrari driver hogged pole for the first three rounds and never qualified outside the first two rows of the grid all season, finishing in a consistent top 5 every race, with the exception of a poor British GP where he finished 15th. The Furrari seemed good over one lap pace, but lacked the raceability to fight for wins, only being able to stand on the top step in Germany; and Austria for his Furrari team mate Nico Stoppelbein. But his consistency kept the reigning world champion there, kept him in the running for the first repeat world Championship since Bentley Maynard's 4th in 2018.

The summer break started with 24 points between them; Prince Avogadro in the lead. Zandvoort was the first race of the second leg and Petri scored his second victory of the season at, but only closed the gap marginally as Prince Avogadro stayed close to claw a second place. Monza mocked them both as Conda pulled a master class for a double podium in front of the Tifosi, and Nico Stoppelbein stepping on the second step for Furrari; Petri finished P4 and Avogadro P6 to close the gap a little more. Avogadro stole pole at Baku and had his championship rival start directly behind him in P3, but come the flag it was the bottom step of the podium for the prince, and a P4 for Saukkonen, bringing the gap back to 17 points as they head the most enduring race of the season; Singapore...

Unfortunately Singapore might have been the tipping point. Whilst Furrari won the race, it was Nico who once again took the top spot and moved him from 5th to 3rd in the driver's championship. Prince Avogadro scored silver once again but Petri Saukkonen was nowhere in sight; a dreadful 14th place made the event pointless for him and the gap between them grew once more, to the largest it would ever be that year; 35 points separate them; more than a win in hand.

The pair seemed equally matched in the final few races; and with each race passing, the total number of points remaining dwindled until, after a lacklustre performance at the Circuit of the Americas, Prince Avogadro was crowned the 2024 Furmula One world champion.
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Once again another stunning picture by The_Raf!

This is one Lazarus and I wanted to get last year but financial issues got in the way so when the time came for Raf to start sketching it, we put it on hold and I got this one instead, with the intention of coming back to this one.

Sure, it's a shame this artwork is out of sequence with the rest, but that was bound to happen eventually.

Prince Avogadro belongs to myself,  AvianBritish
Preti Saukkonen belongs to  LazarusOtter
Cuzata F1 team belongs to  Blaze37
Based on events within  FurmulaOne
Art by  The_Raf
Original