Max Verstappen Wins A Thrilling Austrian GP!

• Austrian GP marked Verstappen’s 2nd consecutive win at the Red Bull Ring and his sixth career win.
• The win helped the Dutch driver reclaim 3rd place in the driver’s standings from Sebastian Vettel.
• McLaren scored another strong points haul by finishing 6th and 8th at the end of the race.
• The race also marked the end of Mercedes’ and Lewis Hamilton’s dominant streak in 2019.
• Honda's first win as an engine supplier after 12 years and 10 months from their last win by Jenson Button.

Mercedes’s dominant winning streak finally came to an end with a thrilling win by Red Bull Honda’s Max Verstappen at the 2019 Austrian Grand Prix. But this was a hard fought win and he achieved it at the last gasp after a thrilling battle with Charles Leclerc over the last two laps. 

The race was set up to be a cracker with Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc on pole and in prime form to finally break Mercedes’s unstoppable winning streak in 2019. Leclerc had a dream start whereas Verstappen had a nightmare start from 2nd place as a fudged start activated the anti-stall system, dropping down all the way to 8th by the first corner. Lower down, Mercedes’s Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton benefitted from Verstappen's awful start but came under massive threat by McLaren’s Lando Norris who nearly jumped Lewis for 3rd. Surprisingly, everyone cleared Lap 1 without a scratch.

In the early stages, the top 3 - Leclerc, Bottas and Hamilton - looked to be well settled, but the real action was behind them. Verstappen was making up places and so was Sebastian Vettel. Vettel had a miserable qualifying, but had a great start and was up to 4th pretty quickly. There was a good scrap lower down with Lando Norris and Alfa Romeo’s Kimi Raikonnen for 6th position, with the Brit winning out in the end.

 

The real fun started once the first and final round of pit stops started to take place. Vettel, Leclerc and Bottas pitted for a set of hard compound tires to get to the end of the race. Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton went 10 laps longer which would have given them a pace advantage towards the end of the race. However, Hamilton could not take advantage of his fresher set of tyres. Verstappen was on a charge, picking off Vettel and then Bottas in quick succession. The only one standing in his way was Leclerc, who was already in a dominant position out front. 

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Eventually, Verstappen hunted down Leclerc with less than 5 laps to go. What ensued was a titanic battle of F1’s next-generation stars with wheel-to-wheel racing in every lap. The battle finally came to a close in an arguably controversial circumstance with an aggressive shove from Verstappen at Turn 3 to take the lead from Leclerc with only 3 laps  to go. Eventually, he crossed the line to take his 6th win of his career, and his 2nd consecutive win at the Red Bull Ring. Leclerc took a close 2nd, Bottas running a quiet 3rd, Vettel recovering to 4th and Hamilton finishing 5th in the end.

Lower down the field, Lando Norris finished an excellent 6th for Mclaren, ahead of Pierre Gasly. McLaren’s Carlos Sainz drove a brilliant race from the back of the field to get 8th place for another strong points haul for McLaren. The two Alfa Romeos of Kimi Raikonnen and Antonio Giovinazzi rounded off the final points offering positions with 9th and 10th.

Outside the top ten, it was a rather quiet affair with both Renault drivers Daniel Ricciardo and Nico Hulkenberg finishing a disappointing 12th and 13th. Perhaps the most disappointing team of the weekend was Haas, yet again struggling with race pace in the end with Romain Grosjean and Kevin Magnussen finishing 16th and 19th, respectively.  

With this result, Max Verstappen reclaimed 3rd place in the driver’s standings from Sebastian Vettel with only a 3-point gap separating the two. This race was also Honda’s first win as an engine supplier since Jenson Button’s sensational win in 2006. Despite Mercedes’s struggles this weekend, they still hold a comfortable lead over the rest in the driver’s and constructor’s standings. 

Formula One will now head to Silverstone for the British Grand Prix, which is scheduled to be held between July 12-14. With the thriller that occured at the same venue last year, there are hopes that this year’s edition will serve up another cracker.

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Image Source: Formula 1