Max Verstappen is so good and the car he drives is so fast that the Dutchman is capable of winning even despite his team. In Austria, his home race, the Red Bull strategists did not know how to read the vicissitudes of a grand prix with a lot of crumbs as usual and they made life difficult for their wonderful child. Verstappen, who has room for that and much more, took it as an extra stimulus, an incentive with which to add a little spice to the military parade that has taken place since the World Cup started in Bahrain at the beginning of March.
With the car rolling at full speed, the suspense lasted for ten laps, from when the current champion lost the lead (lap 25) until he regained it (on lap 35). Once he was repositioned at the front of the squad, the thrillers were over and Mad Max he went straight towards his seventh victory of the course, the fifth in a row, and number 42 on his results sheet, a figure that allows him to distance himself from Ayrton Senna and that places him, at 25 years old, as the fifth rider with the most wins in the history of Formula 1. Charles Leclerc finished second and Checo Perez third, despite having started 15th, further evidence of the brutal superiority of the RB19. Carlos Sainz, for his part, finished fourth after receiving a five-second penalty for exceeding the established track limits, the controversy of the weekend at Spielberg. Fernando Alonso, for his part, finished sixth.
Unlike the winner, Sainz does not have the opportunity to counteract the eagerness that Ferrari seems to have to protect Leclerc, especially when his partner exhibits more pace, something that became evident in the early stages of the test. As if that were not enough, the lack of skill in the first tire change (4.5 seconds) made things even more difficult for Carletes. The contained rage of the man from Madrid became evident in the relentless defense that he made of the last place on the podium that he made against Perez; a delicious scuffle that lasted for six laps (from 57 to 62) and finally fell on the side of the Mexican.
After the review given on Saturday, during the sprint race, in which he gained a 21-second advantage over the second (Perez) in just 24 laps, Verstappen repeated the story on Sunday, a day in which he once again achieved an outstanding performance in everything. , an impression that is measured based on some unquestionable parameters: in addition to the double and the ‘pole position’, the flying Dutchman dared to make one last stop in the garages on the penultimate lap, to rejoin the track and win the fastest lap. quick of all That excellence was not applicable this time to his team, a perfectly lubricated gear that usually works like a Swiss watch, but this time it slipped.
A breakdown in Nico Hulkenberg’s Haas caused the activation of the virtual safety car (lap 14). The warning caught the guides of the red buffalo brand, who kept their first pilot on the track, while their rivals, who were circulating behind, were parading towards the lane to the workshops. This lack of tact led Verstappen to have to run against it, to delay changing tires and to go from leading the group to finding himself third when leaving the garages (lap 25), behind the two Ferraris. In less than five kilometers, the undisputed leader of the points table took Sainz out of the way (lap 26) to do the same with Leclerc a little later (lap 35), and all this before completing half the race.
Of the nine stops on the calendar that have been held so far, seven have been taken by the boy with the number #1, while the other two were signed by Perez, his neighbor. The record for consecutive team victories is held by McLaren with their magical 1988 duo of Senna and Prost. The bets are in favor of Red Bull, which could equal that record in Hungary and surpass it in Belgium, at the end of July.
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Source: EL PAIS
