Spanish GP: Two-time defending World Champion Max Verstappen continued to seek out his brilliance within the 2023 season of Formula 1 as he added another race below his belt on June 4, Sunday. Red Bull driver led from lights out to the chequered flag and clinched his fifth win out of seven races this season. Meanwhile, home favourite Fernando Alonso, who secured a number of podiums this season, endured his worst end of the 12 months, coming home seventh.Â
Polesitter Verstappen and his Red Bull appeared unstoppable and quick all through the 66-lap race. He was challenged by Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz for a quick interval when the race started on flip 1 of lap 1, however the Dutchman fended the opposite Spaniard Sainz to maintain his lead intact. Notably, the revitalised Mercedes took the opposite two podiums, with 7-time champion Lewis Hamilton coming second in entrance of George Russell.
Verstappen’s teammate and title rival within the preliminary section of the season, Sergio Perez secured fourth and conceded extra factors within the championship battle. The quickest lap was additionally secured by Verstappen. After registering the win, Verstappen was full of enjoyment for the automotive. “It’s such a big pleasure to drive a car like this. And it displayed again today. We were on different tyre strategies today and mostly I was on the right one! And to win here is incredible,” Verstappen mentioned after the win.
Meanwhile, Hamilton heaped reward on Mercedes’ progress. “This is what we have been hoping for once we introduced the upgrades. I imply we’d hoped for extra within the sense of an even bigger step. The precise efficiency step they instructed us was below two-tenths, so it wasn’t like a… That’s nonetheless good, not the step that everybody is working so laborious in direction of, however we’ll nonetheless take it,” Hamilton mentioned.
“But this result is certainly what we have been working in direction of. This is wonderful and it’s right down to all the nice, nice work that is happening with the individuals again on the manufacturing facility, preserving their heads down. I hope everyone seems to be feeling actually proud again on the manufacturing facility. George did a extremely good job right this moment, so we delivered good factors on an entire. We’ve simply obtained to attempt to hold this up. For us to be faster than the Ferraris and the Astons right this moment was actually mega,” the Mercedes driver added.
Behind Perez, Ferrari’s Sainz got here home in fifth, whereas the 2 Aston Martins then lined up with Lance Stroll taking sixth and Alonso ending seventh. Alpine’s Esteban Ocon was eighth forward of Zhou Guanyu of Alfa Romeo and Pierre Gasly of Alpine.
With this double podium end, Mercedes have additionally leapfrogged Alpine within the race for the constructors and now stand in second with 152 factors behind Red Bull, who’ve 287 to their title. In the drivers’ standings, Verstappen is 53 factors away from second-placed Perez, who has 117 factors to his title.
