British Grand Prix: Verstappen wins with Norris and Hamilton on the podium | Formula 1

A festive day for the winner RBR and McLaren, the home team, at the British Grand Prix on Sunday. In the eighth victory of two-time champion Max Verstappen this season, the British team won its first podium in 2023 with second place Lando Norris, who led the race for five laps by beating the Dutchman at the start. The one who completed the podium was compatriot Lewis Hamilton, who started seventh and won his 13th podium at Silverstone.

The Dutch RBR extended its dominance in the championship with its eighth win in ten races and the forty-third pole position of its career. Norris, in turn, secured his seventh podium in Formula 1 and, moreover, ended McLaren’s fast of just over a year without a podium finish. Hamilton now has 195 podium finishes – his fourth of the season. He was ahead of Oscar Biastri, in his best race of his rookie season.

Just as in Saturday’s qualifying, Britain’s Max saw McLaren look like it was taking him out of his comfort zone; He was passed by Norris at the start and still had to hold off Piastri. However, the two-time champion needed five laps to regain the advantage and control the rest of the race.

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McLaren’s result gives the green light to the team’s upgrade package, which has modified the front wing, nose and rear suspension after modifications in Austria. Piastri received the same improvements this weekend that Norris already had at the Spielberg rink when he finished fourth.

Sergio Pérez finished sixth after starting 15th. His comeback race started in the first 16 laps as he gained five positions. Once in the podium area, he took the lead, taking advantage of the competitors’ pit stops. After stopping on lap 29, he returned to the top ten due to a safety car caused by the breakdown of Kevin Magnussen on lap 33. In the end, he passed Mexican Fernando Alonso.

The safety car was the biggest factor in Hamilton’s recovery, who started seventh behind team-mate George Russell and watched his teammate move up to eighth. Russell failed to extend his run on the soft tires for another four laps, took a long time at the pit stop and ended up being passed by his teammate, who inherited third after a Piastri change.

Alpine left the weekend clean due to the retirement of Esteban Ocon on lap 10, with a hydraulic leak, and that of Pierre Gasly, who suffered damage to his car after a collision with Lance Stroll on lap 46. The Aston Martin driver was penalized five seconds for what happened.

In a rare event of the season, Verstappen did not confirm his pole position and saw Norris pull up in front of him just before the first corner. Piastri also tried to pass the double champion on the outside but was unable to overtake him, despite making other attempts throughout the opening lap.

The Dutchman even tried to take revenge. But the attempt exposed him more to Pastri, although the positions were maintained until the second lap. Right behind him, George Russell managed to take fifth place from Carlos Sainz, but Lewis Hamilton wasn’t as lucky as his teammate, surviving the track at the start and moving from seventh to eighth.

Norris opened up half a second to Verstappen on the second lap and even doubled his advantage over the RBR driver. However, the two-time champion didn’t let it come cheap and began to chip away at that difference on lap three – keeping a short but steady distance from Piastri.

McLaren’s advantage lasted only five laps: Max finally regained the lead on the fifth lap of the race, at Brooklands Corner. From there, the two-time champion began building his advantage; Already on 2 seconds after 15 laps, he more than doubled the number on the 20th and reached 8 seconds by the 28th lap of the race. From there, he never left.

The middle faction goes into battle

If nothing changes for the top three in the first half of the race, the drivers in the middle of the grid have had a tight race from the start. Such was the case with Russell. He finished fifth behind Charles Leclerc, and stayed close to the Monaco driver for nearly 20 laps, reaching 0 just one second.

At one point, the pair had contact between the Hangar Straight and the Vale Curve. Russell complained about taking an alleged brake test. Leclerc visited the pits on lap 19, lifting the Mercedes driver up to fourth.

Hamilton began to rule out the small loss at the start and passed Fernando Alonso to return to seventh on lap 7. The seven-time champion rose to sixth with Leclerc stopping and then to fifth with Carlos Sainz replacing him on the 27th lap. His Mercedes teammate swap earned him fourth place. Russell managed to make his soft tires last 29 laps, but a slow pit stop dropped him to ninth.

Albon fell from eighth to tenth at the start and was out of the points when he was passed by Sergio Pérez on the sixteenth lap. However, Leclerc’s pit stop put him back in the top ten, just behind the Mexican RBR. On lap 29, Anglo-Tay, eighth, moved up to seventh, taking advantage of a tire change by Checo, who was ahead of him.

The race remained stable until lap 30, when Piastri opened the top 3 pit stops and opened the way for Hamilton to finish third. However, Kevin Magnussen’s Haas car caught fire and came to a stop on the track on lap 33, and he called the virtual and then the safety car to the track. However, Albon, Leclerc, Bottas, Tsunoda, Hulkenberg and De Vries visited the pits.

On the next lap, it was the turn of the top four: Verstappen, Norris, Hamilton and Alonso – RBR leader and seven-time Mercedes champion changing the medium tires to soft tyres. Bad news for Russell, who gave up extending his initial stint and moved away from the podium area.

The race restarted on lap 39 from 52. Max remained the leader, but Hamilton started on Norris who knew how to defend himself even from his compatriot’s boat at Copse Curve. Piastri, who finished fourth, closed in on the Mercedes veteran, although he didn’t move any further.

Carlos Sainz started the race in fifth place and was already seventh after the safety car that followed his pit stop in the first half of the race. However, the Spaniard struggled to be overtaken three times by Perez, Albon and Leclerc on lap 44 and was running tenth.

He barely had time to react and, immediately after, saw Gasly pass him and take him out of the scoring zone. However, the Frenchman’s lead would not last until a lap longer; He retired from racing with a flat tyre.