Verstappen cruises to record 14th victory of 2022

After acing the start from pole and once it became clear well ahead of the final laps that his medium tyres would hold on, Verstappen dominated to take a 14th victory of 2022 and in doing so set a new record for single season wins.

Home hero Sergio Perez finished third ahead of George Russell, with the Ferrari drivers a minute behind by the finish in fifth and sixth.

At the start, Verstappen launched well in front of Russell and swung right in front of the Mercedes on the very long run down to the first corner – with Russell gaining from the Red Bull’s slipstream to run ahead of Hamilton and Perez.

Just before they braked for Turn 1, Russell moved left to the outside line but ended up just following Verstappen through the right hander and deep towards the grass runoff on the outside.

As Verstappen scampered through unopposed, Russell bounced over the kerbs at Turn 2, with Hamilton by this time alongside his team-mate and getting ahead with better drive out of Turn 3.

There, Russell came along Hamilton but ran out of room and had to climb over the kerbs, therefore losing momentum and being jumped the quickly arriving Perez into Turn 4 at the end of the second straight.

Verstappen immediately moved out of DRS threat at the end of lap one of 71, with Hamilton giving chase having started on the medium tyres, as did Russell, compared to the used softs fitted to the two Red Bulls.

Over the next phase of the race, the gap between the leaders fluctuated slightly, but generally held around 1.5s as Perez and Russell ran a few seconds further adrift and falling further behind over the course of the first stint.

Approaching the end of the race’s first quarter, Verstappen upped his pace in a bid to break the tow to the Mercedes, but Hamilton was able to hang on just over two seconds behind before the leader’s softs began to give up.

From a maximum of 2.4s, Verstappen’s advantage was down to 1.6s by the time he came in at the end of lap 25 – one tour after Perez had pitted and suffered a slow left-rear change that left him stationary for 5.0s.

Running the more durable tyre, Mercedes left Hamilton out – his mediums showing none of the dark wear patches that had been evident on Verstappnen’s left-front soft before he stopped.

But Hamilton only remained out for another four laps before he was brought in to switch to the hard tyres, with Mercedes instead leaving Russell out…