AUSTRIAN GP – Max Verstappen dominates a thrilling sprint battle beating Oscar Piastri by four and a half seconds
Max Verstappen has beaten by Oscar Piastri four and a half seconds to win the Sprint at the Austrian Grand Prix. The Dutchman fended off Piastri and his McLaren teammateLando Norris from the very start, as he eked out a lead through the race but once again it was not a dominating win as both McLaren’s challenged him through the early phases.
Verstappen’s latest victory, his third in the three Sprint events so far this season and his tenth in the short-form format overall, adds two extra points on to his world championship lead over Norris to give him a 71-point advantage.
Norris only briefly lost second to Piastri when he tried to lunge pass Verstappen on Lap Five at AMG AS before the Australian closed in and passed his teammate a few corners later. Verstappen was then able to pull away following that battle between the two McLaren’s, as Piastri closed the gap when they both ran too deep at AMG AS and Rauch.
Having held a watching brief close behind the duelling leaders, Piastri then sensed his own chance and, with his teammate disadvantaged on the corner exit, the Australian got around the outside of the sister McLaren on the curved run to Turn Five.
Norris left enough space on the inside for Verstappen to hit back immediately and retake the lead despite locking up his right front, which sent Norris slightly wide and created a gap that Piastri surged into to take second from his teammate. It wasn’t only Piastri who closed in on the top two, George Russell who made a similar move at Rauch got past Carlos Sainz three laps later.
However following that move early on, Russell began to drop away too with him falling three seconds behind Norris and the rest of the field started to spread out. Sainz was just over a second and a half behind Russell as the Ferrari driver spilt the Mercedes nearly a second and a quarter ahead of Hamilton.
Verstappen admitted that “once the DRS opens, it was very hard to get out of it” but was pleased to eventually be able to pull away from his pursuers. he said, “A few exciting battles as well but once we cleared the DRS, I could do my own race and it was better. You could see they had two cars pushing flat-out trying to make it difficult for me.”
Norris said, “Just a bit silly from my side. Otherwise, it was a good race. I made the most of some of the opportunities I had. If I waited one more lap, I probably would have lost any more opportunities. I did half the job, just didn’t finish it off. Room for improvement from my side, for sure. Not to the level it needs to be.”
It was a brilliant opening lap for Charles Leclerc, he was tenth in sprint qualifying, before a rapid rise to seventh where he finished two seconds behind the seven-time champion. Sergio Perez was the final point scorer in eight just under four seconds behind Leclerc and comfortably ahead of Kevin Magnussen. While Lance Stroll completed the top ten six seconds behind the Haas.
Their could be more pressure on Perez following another disappointing race, he once again is showing signs which have plagued him at Red Bull, after agreeing new contracts he has then struggled to take the fight to Verstappen and those chasing him. While Magnussen put up a determined display on his way to ninth, followed by Stroll and the Alpine duo of Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly, who were unable to build on their qualifying efforts and failed to score.
Nico Hulkenberg split the two RBs, the German driver nearly three seconds behind Yuki Tsunoda and nearly a second ahead of Daniel Ricciardo. Hulkenberg having a brief moment with Fernando Alonso at AMG As, with the two-time champion settling for sixteenth behind Ricciardo.
it was a quiet outing for the Williams and Sauber drivers, with Logan Sargeant leading home Albon after the latter’s pit lane start, and Valtteri Bottas beating teammate Guanyu Zhou to the flag.