Verstappen wins after late pressure from Norris

Higher tyre degradation than expected compared to when Red Bull struggled badly for car balance in practice on Friday appeared to ease Verstappen’s path, as he was also boosted by the set-up work completed at his team’s factory ahead of qualifying.

Norris did mount a ferocious late-race charge as he worked his hard tyres better than Verstappen in the second of two stints, but the world champion held on to win by 0.7s.

“It hurts me to say, but one or two more laps and I think I would’ve had him,” the Norris said said afterwards.

“Tough, a shame. I fought hard right to the very last lap. We just lost out a little bit too much to Max in the beginning. He was much better in the first stint and obviously in the second we were stronger.

“That just was a tough first half and a much better second half. One or two more laps would’ve been beautiful, just not today.”

At the start, Norris did gain slightly on polesitter Verstappen when they reacted to the lights, but his line took him to the outside of the track’s first braking point at the Tamburello chicane where he could not get near enough to make an attack.

As Charles Leclerc and his Ferrari team-mate Carlos Sainz slotted in behind the leaders, Verstappen scampered clear enough to deprive Norris of DRS even when it was activated on lap two of 63.

Verstappen then just tore regular chunks from his rival to build his lead to 6.5s by lap 22 – although he did make his life harder later in the race for abusing track limits to such an extent he was formally warned by the FIA.

Norris initially dropped Leclerc in the first stint before the Ferrari closed back in, with Norris becoming the first of the leaders to pit on lap 22 to go from the mediums they had all started on to the hards, with Verstappen coming in two laps later.

Leclerc was left out until lap 25, which meant Norris eased away, as pushing early in the second stint and Sainz stopping even later allowed Oscar Piastri to undercut the second Ferrari for fourth – having chased Sainz closely for most of the first stint.

Verstappen started the final stint with a 5.6s lead thanks to Norris’s earlier stop, with the Dutchman then rebuilding his lead over the next phase, albeit not as rapidly as at the start.

Indeed, at this stage Leclerc chomped into what had been a…