Lando Norris has taken back-to-back wins with a dominant eleven-second victory in an action-packed Dutch Grand Prix to reignite his championship defence. The McLaren driver kept his cool and took advantage when he got a great run out of the final corner as the race entered the final quarter; he came from a long way back to dive around the outside and take the lead.
The race proved eventful from the very start, full of action, with the home favourite Max Verstappen crashing out at the final corner, bringing out the Red Flag; he lost the rear and spun heavily into the barrier. In a separate incident, Gabriel Bortoleto spun on the open lap but avoided contact with Verstappen and was able to take the restart.
Verstappen dipped a tyre onto the white line on the inside of the final corner, causing the Red Bull driver to spin into the barrier, leaving vast debris on the circuit. After the race, he said he believed he was on a dry bit of track and could accelerate again, but accelerated more than he expected.
Norris, following the restart, appeared then to play the long game once again, having lost the lead to Antonelli before spending much of the race shadowing the Italian. He was then able to attack the Mercedes driver on fresher rubber as he started to lose grip before the decisive moves came first, passing Lewis Hamilton at the final corner, which then gave him the run on the Mercedes to Tarzan, where he passed to secure victory.
McLaren’s significant upgrade in Budapest has propelled the reigning champion back into at least a deciding role in the outcome of this championship; however, the big question is how they perform in Monza, Baku and Sepang. High-speed and downforce circuits before Singapore, which has been historically Mercedes’ biggest weakness.
The restart was perhaps key in Norris’s second win of the season; he had made a poor getaway at the actual start but aced the restart to take the lead. There will be questions whether he is now the most likely challenger to Antonelli for what in the early races looked to be an unlikely championship defence.
Mercedes had decided shortly before the final stages to switch Antonelli with teammate George Russell, but ultimately the decision didn’t pay off. Russell did manage to defend off Hamilton thanks to a VSC and the Ferrari running out of sync on strategy and a slow stop, when he stopped on Lap Fifty-Seven.
That left the seven-time champion unable to recover enough ground to try and pass his former teammate as he closed to within eight and a half tenths. One of the big questions going into this second half of the season will be whether this championship has been transformed into a fight between the two Mercedes, Hamilton and Norris.
Norris said, “A tough race. Yesterday I said we needed to out on a bit of a show for everyone for the final race here. I made it tough for myself today but a good race, well fought. Probably one of my better wins; we had to fight for it. The pace was very strong and we managed things well. Over the moon, very happy. Nice to win the final race in Zandvoort.
Antonelli added, “It was a very intense race. I managed to get the lead, the I just didn’t have the feeling with the car. It was sliding a lot, Lando passed me and I knew I had no chance after that. George was a great team player, happy for him to hold onto p3 as well.”
Russell, who finished in third place: “It was a difficult start for me, obviously losing the position. These two [Lando Norris and Kimi Antonelli] were very quick at the beginning and Lando was just exceptionally fast towards the end of the race so it was tough to hold on in those old tyres. I’m happy to be standing here on the podium because It could have gone either way.”
Antonelli extends his lead by nine, taking his total lead over teammate Russell to fifty-nine, but those nine points have drawn Russell level with Hamilton, though more wins puts him ahead of the Ferrari. Mercedes leads Ferrari by eighty-eight points in the constructors, with McLaren seventy-five further behind.
Hamilton insists his aim remains unchanged to lead Ferrari back to a championship, having been the driver to deny them their last realistic one in 2008. He told Sky Sports, “Today was definitely frustrating for me. I’m here to win and I think this team can win. We couldn’t win this race, but to win championships you have to pick up every point and the last few races have been difficult with penalties and stuff, and then today I lost several seconds behind Charles, which I think ultimately could have made the difference in the end.”
Hamilton believed that he was losing time behind his teammate, as he had a tyre offset compared to Leclerc at one of the key moments in the race, as Ferrari dithered over whether to use team orders.
Leclerc believes they lost out by making the call to double-stop behind the VSC, but ultimately lost out because of their poor qualifying. That was despite him ignored this instruction and retained track position over Hamilton for another lap before finally coming in.
Behind the close fight, Oscar Piastri finished the race fifteen seconds behind the leading group as he appeared to be in no-man’s land, finishing four-seven seconds ahead of Liam Lawson. Lawson put in a decent result, standing in for the injured Isack Hadjar as he was forty-seven seconds behind after an added ten-second time penalty for causing a collision.
Nico Hulkenberg took brilliant avoiding action to not crash into teammate Bortoleto at the start as well as the Verstappen incident to bring his Audi home eighth, but the Brazilian led the lapped cars. Aston Martin’s upgraded power unit allowed them to take ninth with Fernando Alonso.
The upgrade also to the chassis in Budapest, and the way the Spaniard managed a one-stop saw him finish a second ahead of Pierre Gasly as they rounded out the points. The veteran Spaniard, who has still not decided whether to continue in F1 next year, ran a super-long 34-lap stint on soft tyres at the start, before switching to hards.
The final stages of the race saw him fighting to stay ahead of the Alpine and Yuki Tsunoda, closing in fast on much fresher medium and soft tyres. But Alonso measured his pace to perfection. Alonso’s result paints a confusing picture, while Honda has made progress; the question is how much and how much is down to Aston Martin’s own upgrades?
Lawson’s replacement at Racing Bull’s Tsunoda has put in a solid performance this weekend, the Japanese driver a comfortable eleven seconds ahead of Bortoleto, who recovered from his opening lap spin.
The Brazilian a lap ahead of Franco Colapinto, with Sergio Perez thirty-eight seconds ahead of Carlos Sainz, who was given a ten-second penalty for causing a collision, and his teammate Alex Albon classified seventeenth but retired on lap sixty-six.
Related
- Dutch GP – Qualifying Result
- DUTCH GP – Lando Norris beats both Mercedes by a tenth to secure pole in subdue end to qualifying
- Dutch GP – Sprint Result
- DUTCH GP – George Russell converts pole into a second victory in the sprint ahead of Charles Leclerc
- Dutch GP – Sprint Qualifying Result
- DUTCH GP – George Russell pips Lando Norris by four hundredths to take sprint pole
- DUTCH GP – Kimi Antonelli a tenth faster than Lando Norris in practice ahead of a possible tight sprint qualifying
- Welcome to the Dutch Grand Prix – 20/08/2026
- PRIXVIEW – Dutch Grand Prix
