Max Verstappen won Sunday’s Dutch Grand Prix ahead of George Russell and Charles Leclerc to nudge his Formula One Drivers’ Championship lead past 100 points.
The 24-year-old began on pole at Zandvoort but almost lost out on a second victory in successive years on home soil, with Mercedes having both Lewis Hamilton and Russell ahead of the current world champion before a late safety car period.
With Verstappen having pitted for fresh soft tires, Russell did the same, dropping behind the Red Bull and rendering race leader Hamilton a sitting duck on the restart. Verstappen swiftly re-took the lead and secured his tenth from 15 grands prix so far this season.
Hamilton, having looked at one stage like he could take his first win since the Brazilian Grand Prix last year, was left furious and dropped down to fourth by the time the checkered flag was waved.
More from formula 1
Mercedes and Hamilton can win despite error
Mercedes unquestionably made the wrong call in the safety car period, as they essentially gave themselves zero chance of winning rather than keeping both cars out on circuit in first and second, in order to try and fight as hard as possible to keep Verstappen behind – which in itself would have been unlikely.
Once the dust had settled, though, Hamilton was focused on being optimistic about the team’s undoubtedly impressive performance in the Netherlands and their prospects of continuing to improve before the end of the season.
“The strategy and the car had been so good up until that point,” Hamilton told Sky Sports. “The pit stops were perfect, the best we’ve had this year. It was geeing me up, I was thinking we are all really on it today. I was hopeful we were going to get a 1-2 today.
“We haven’t had a win since Brazil [last year], and it was finally there within our grasp. The safety car really didn’t help and I was on the edge of breaking point with emotions. My apologies to the team, I just lost it for a second. It’s just so much passion. I want to look at it as a glass half full. If this can be the same in the coming races, we can win.”
More from formula 1
Ferrari’s endless fiascos mean something must change
Ferrari were never really in contention for the win at Zandvoort after Verstappen managed to hold off the challenge of both Leclerc and team-mate Carlos Sainz into Turn 1. But the Italian outfit still continued their relentless record of shooting themselves in the foot on strategy to make things worse.
Early in the race a late call was made by the Scuderia pit wall to bring Sainz in for fresh tires as he rounded the final corner, leaving the mechanics without enough time to get the wheels out, and meaning Sainz sat in his pit box for over 12 seconds while the Ferrari crew scrambled to attach the full set of new rubber.
With his race already ruined, the Spaniard was later given a five-second time penalty for an unsafe release from his pit box, dropping him down to eighth come the finish.
This season Ferrari have made huge errors on their pit wall almost every single weekend, and things are not improving. A significant change of some sort needs to be made in order to protect the team from itself at this stage.
F1 2022 Dutch Grand Prix result
- Max Verstappen – Red Bull – 1:36:42.773
- George Russell – Mercedes – +4.071
- Charles Leclerc – Ferrari – +10,929
- Lewis Hamilton – Mercedes – +13.016
- Sergio Perez – Red Bull – +18,168
- Fernando Alonso—Alpine—+18,754
- Lando Norris-McLaren- +19.306
- Carlos Sainz – Ferrari – +20.916
- Esteban Ocon – Alpine – +21.117
- Lance Stroll – Aston Martin – +22.459
- Pierre Gasly – AlphaTauri – +27.009
- Alex Albon-Williams- +30.390
- Mick Schumacher – Haas – +32,995
- Sebastian Vettel – Aston Martin – +36.007
- Kevin Magnussen – Haas – +36,869
- Zhou Guanyu – Alfa Romeo – +37.320
- Daniel Ricciardo – McLaren – +37.764
- Nicholas Latifi – Williams – +1 lap
- Valtteri Bottas – Alfa Romeo – +1 lap
- (DNF) Yuki Tsunoda – AlphaTauri
Red Bull strategists are imperious
While Ferrari and Mercedes were making mistakes around them, Red Bull were perfect on strategy, ensuring they won the race on a weekend when their car was not necessarily much faster than its rivals.
The Milton Keynes-based team are going to win both championships primarily because they have produced the year’s best car and possess the fastest racing driver in the world. But the precision of their strategy has been spot on for the vast majority of the season, and any outfit that makes few errors is always going to run more efficiently than ones that make plenty.
Much credit for this win and the campaign as a whole must therefore go to principal strategy engineer Hannah Schmitz, who seemingly always gets the big calls right.
Hannah Schmitz is one of the most important members of the Red Bull team (Photo: Getty)
FIA should move quicker on safety car calls
The late safety car which changed the end of the race was brought about when Valtteri Bottas’ Alfa Romeo conked out at the end of the pit straight before Turn 1, the car left strewn on the circuit with its driver unable to shift it out of the way.
For some reason, an entire lap of racing passed before the FIA race director team intervened to bring the safety car out, even though one was evidently needed from the moment Bottas parked up in the middle of a high speed section of the track.
F1 2022 drivers’ standings
- Max Verstappen – 309
- Charles Leclerc – 201
- Sergio Perez – 201
- George Russell-188
- Carlos Sainz-175
- Lewis Hamilton—158
- Lando Norris—82
- Esteban Ocon-66
- Fernando Alonso-59
- Valtteri Bottas – 46
- Kevin Magnussen – 22
- Sebastian Vettel – 20
- Daniel Ricciardo – 19
- Pierre Gasly – 18
- Mick Schumacher – 12
- Yuki Tsunoda – 11
- Zhou Guanyu-5
- Lance Stroll – 5
- Alex Albon – 4
- Nicholas Latifi – 0
- Nico Hulkenberg – 0
Earlier there was an equally slow reaction when Yuki Tsunoda broke down, with plenty of time passing before the virtual safety car neutralized the race.
The delays were strange considering both incidents clearly required an intervention and would be best avoided in future races.
