SPA-FRANCHORCHAMPS, Belgium—Max Verstappen took another victory Sunday afternoon at the Belgian Grand Prix by winning by 22 seconds ahead of his Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez with Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc in third.
"It's a new spot, that's for sure - P6.” said Verstappen about his starting the race from sixth position due to a power unit change. “I knew that we had a great car. It was just about surviving turn one.”
With this win in the Ardennes, Verstappen’s victory is the eighth win in a row for the Dutchman, and except for a couple of wins by Perez, Red Bull has dominated every race this season going into the summer break, which will return in the week of August 23-25 at Zandvoort in the Netherlands.
The different starting position did not stop the Dutchman from moving up quickly to third after only a couple of laps. Up front, Perez did not take long to pass Leclerc down the Kemmel straight to take the lead, which he kept even after Verstappen passed Leclerc to take second. With the Red Bulls 1-2 only after a few laps, Perez pitted later and this gave Verstappen the lead for good, which he increased his time even after a non-threatening light rain shower came midway through the race. Verstappen ended up easily taking the win by more than 20 seconds over his teammate.
Two drivers retired from the race because of an incident at La Source at the start by Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz and McLaren’s Oscar Piastri. The Spaniard shut the door on the Australian on this right-hand turn, causing them to both touch. This made Piastri retire just laps later when he pulled off the circuit up from Eau Rouge. Sainz could do no better with his amount of damage but lasted just a little bit longer in the race, retiring finally on lap 24.
Lewis Hamilton took fourth, but late in the race, the Mercedes driver pitted for soft tyres and set the fastest lap of the race, denying Verstappen one championship point. Double points for Aston Martin, with Fernando Alonso fifth and Lance Stroll ninth, while the second Mercedes of George Russell finished sixth. McLaren’s Lando Norris took seventh, with Alpine’s Esteban Ocon was eighth, and Alpha Tauri’s Yuki Tsunoda took the last point position in tenth.
Verstappen now leads Perez by 125 points with an even tighter battle going on for third as Alonso only leads Hamilton by one point. For Verstappen, it might seem too many to be another easy victory, but the Dutchman had still some issues to deal with.
"I could see it was all getting really tight.” Continued Verstappen. “I've been in that position before myself, so I am just going to stay out of that, and it worked out. From there onwards I made the right overtakes, moves. I just got a little bit stuck in the beginning in a DRS Zone and once that cleared, I could just do my own thing - really enjoyable."
By Mark Gero
