Max Verstappen’s seventh win in 10 races prompted the usual knee-jerk claims on social media that Red Bull are still F1’s dominant team.
The reality is quite different. Red Bull may still be winning but life is much more difficult for them than it was 12 months ago. To appreciate that, compared Verstappen’s victory yesterday with his win at the same circuit in 2023.
Last year he led from lights to flag, stretching his first stint so long he was able to pit after his closest challengers and still come out ahead. Verstappen won by 24 seconds, and illustrating how conservatively he was driving, he lowered his lap times by almost two seconds on the 61st tour to claim the bonus point for fastest lap without needing to pit for a fresh set of tyres.
Last weekend Verstappen faced real competition. He took pole position by nearly half a second in 2023, but Lando Norris snatched it from him by two-hundredths of a second this time.
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After George Russell beat the pair of them to turn one, Verstappen had to make his way past the Mercedes to gain the lead. From there his position became more comfortable, but he still had to keep an eye on the rapid Norris closing in behind. At the flag, four drivers from three teams took the chequered flag closer to Verstappen than last year’s second-place finisher:
The McLaren driver knew his car had been quick enough to win, and Verstappen had bested him on the day. “We should have won today,” said Norris. “We had the quickest car. But I just lost it at the start and then I couldn’t get past George for the first stint.”
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This was the second race in a row which Norris felt he should have won. A missed chance to pit when the Safety Car was deployed during the Canadian Grand Prix two weeks earlier allowed Verstappen to get ahead of him on that occasion.
Red Bull rarely make such slips, and demonstrated their tactical mastery again yesterday. While Norris and the Ferrari drivers joined Verstappen in saving a new set of soft tyres from the race, only Red Bull chose not to use theirs for the start, keeping them for the final stint, where they proved crucial in allowing Verstappen to out-run Norris.
“Clearly today we just lacked a bit of that outright pace,” said Verstappen. “Just when we had to push, we just couldn’t look after the tyres like…
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