Max Verstappen dominated the fight for pole position at the Japanese Grand Prix ahead of rookie Oscar Piastri, who took his first grand prix front-row start at Suzuka.
Verstappen steamrolled the competition on his way to an advantage of more than half a second at the end of the hour to put his Red Bull team on track to win the constructors championship on Sunday.
The only wrinkle in an otherwise easy day for the Dutchman came in Q1, when Williams rookie Logan Sargeant crashed out of the session without a time, causing an almost 15-minute suspension.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen completed a practice clean sweep of the Japanese Grand Prix but with a reduced margin to Lando Norris in second.
Verstappen left it late to set his final flying lap, logging a 1m30.267s, the fastest time of the weekend so far. But Norris and McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri were within striking distance in second and third with newfound performance gains the long first sector.
Norris was 0.24s off Verstappen’s pace, with Piastri just 0.048s further back.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen topped second practice at the Japanese Grand Prix with a reduced margin ahead of Charles Leclerc after a clumsy Pierre Gasly crash ended practice early.
Gasly was following teammate Esteban Ocon through the second Degner corner where he understeered off track and through the gravel, where he dragged his left-front wheel along the barriers and snapped his suspension. With less than two minutes left on the clock, the session ended with the flying of red flag to collect the stricken Alpine.
The shortened session was of no consequence to Verstappen, who ended Friday on top with an ultimate time of 1m30.688s, heading Leclerc and the rest of the field by 0.32s.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen set a foreboding pace in an overcast first practice session for the Japanese Grand Prix. The Dutchman fired early, taking top spot just minutes into the hour-long session and improving his time with every stint on fresh tires.
The Red Bull driver started on the hards, switched to Pirelli’s experimental medium tire and concluded with a blistering time on the softs. His final time of 1m31.647s blitzed Ferrari’s Singapore Grand Prix winner Carlos Sainz by 0.626s, the world champion fastest in every sector in part thanks to a brand-new Honda power unit bolted to the back of his car.
Lando Norris was third quickest for McLaren, 0.745s behind Verstappen after a late lap on fresh softs but 0.182s quicker that Charles Leclerc, who was 0.927s adrift.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen cruised to a record-breaking 10th consecutive victory after seizing the lead from pole-getter Carlos Sainz after 15 laps.
Verstappen had been confident ahead of the race that his Red Bull Racing car had the better race pace, and by lap 4 of the grand prix he was already noting that the leading Ferrari car was struggling with its tires.
On lap 6, Verstappen was testing Sainz’s defenses with an attempted move around the outside into the first turn, though the Spaniard rebuffed him easily by closing the door through the chicane. But what seemed like only a matter of time suddenly started to appear in doubt. Charles Leclerc, who had held third off the line, closed in on the battling duo and threatened to turn the race into a brawl.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen has won his home Dutch Grand Prix on a chaotic mixed-weather afternoon for a record-equaling ninth consecutive race victory.
Verstappen started on pole position and held the lead off the line, but his win was far from assured by the time he got to the final corner, where the heavens had opened to dump heavy rain onto the circuit.
Though rain was on the radar, it hadn’t been forecast to arrive for another half-hour, catching teams and drivers by surprise. Barely a handful of drivers responded by pitting for intermediate tires immediately. Sergio Perez, having started seventh, was the first among those to enter pit lane.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen claimed a comfortable victory from sixth on the grid at the Belgian Grand Prix ahead of Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez.
Perez had started from the front row and snatched the lead from polesitter Charles Leclerc at the end of the Kemmel straight on the first lap control the race early on. But Verstappen was already up to fourth by then, behind Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton, and the Dutchman was targeting the top step.
The championship leader bided his time to make his moves. On lap 6 he snatched third from Hamilton at the end of the Kemmel straight, and on three laps later he mugged Leclerc on the brakes to take second place around the outside of Les Combes.
Continue reading on RACERRed Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner has lauded his team for breaking the 35-year-old record for successive victories previously held by McLaren.
Max Verstappen’s victory at the Hungarian Grand Prix was the 12th in a row for Red Bull Racing, dating back to last year’s season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, taking it one race clear of McLaren’s 1988 record.
The legendary 1988 McLaren MP4/4 won 11 straight grands prix in an almost perfect season in which Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost combined to claim 15 of 16 race victories.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen has won his seventh successive grand prix in a masterclass performance at the Hungarian Grand Prix.
The victory was Red Bull Racing’s 12th in a row, eclipsing the previous record set by McLaren in 1988.
Verstappen started second on the grid alongside pole-getter Lewis Hamilton but wasted no time snatching the lead into the first turn. The Dutchman was daring on the brakes into the hairpin, defying a Hamilton squeeze to emerge from the apex with first place.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen thinks his Saturday weakness could be a Sunday strength after missing out on pole by just 0.003s with chronic balance problems.
Since he first got in the car on Friday, Verstappen has looked uncomfortable with the set-up of his upgraded Red Bull Racing machine. He regularly radioed his team during practice to ask if there was a problem with his car to explain its seemingly random handling behavior, notwithstanding the weekend’s blustery conditions.
Budapest fans were subsequently treated to the rare sight of the Dutchman having to set a banker lap in Q2 after having an earlier lap deleted for exceeding track limits. RBR sent him onto the track out of sync with the rest of the field to ensure the lap was clean, an unusually cautious approach for the runaway championship leader.
Continue reading on RACERSergio Perez says he isn’t concerned about the threat posed by Daniel Ricciardo being back on the grid despite the Australian’s intention to take his Red Bull Racing seat.
Ricciardo is Red Bull Racing’s reserve driver this season but has been loaned to the sister AlphaTauri team to replace the ousted Nyck de Vries for the rest of the year. The sudden switch was made after Ricciardo set a time quick enough to have been on the front row of the British Grand Prix during a Pirelli tire test at Silverstone last week.
The test came just days after Perez started the British race 16th, having been knocked out of Q1 for the third time this season. It was also the sixth time in 10 rounds he had failed to qualify inside the top 10 for a grand prix.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen led Red Bull Racing to a record-equaling 11th consecutive grand prix win with a straightforward victory at the British Grand Prix.
The triumphant streak, dating back to last year’s Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, matches McLaren’s legendary 1988 streak that saw the team win all but one race that season.
Verstappen was made to work for his win in the opening phase of the race, when he was jumped from pole by second-place starter Lando Norris.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen secured pole for the British Grand Prix ahead of a surprise McLaren two-three led by Lando Norris.
The qualifying hour started in the damp, but grip ramped up rapidly as the sun broke through the clouds and dried the track into its optimum window by Q3.
The tricky conditions caught out Verstappen’s teammate, Sergio Perez, in Q1, delivering him his third bottom-five elimination of the season in another body blow to the Mexican’s campaign.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen doubled down on his Friday practice advantage with another session-topping time in FP2 for the British Grand Prix.
Verstappen lowered his FP1 benchmark by more than half a second to string together his best time of 1m28.078s. But his advantage over the field was much reduced compared to the earlier session, with Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz lapping just 0.022s slower and pinching the fastest time in the final sector.
It was a promising result for the cautiously optimistic Italian team after applying a raft of upgrades to the car in recent rounds.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen has started the British Grand Prix weekend in strong form, leading a foreboding Red Bull Racing one-two in the weekend’s first practice session.
Verstappen hammered in two times on softs quick enough to top the session, his best being a 1m28.600s set on used rubber. Teammate Sergio Perez’s second attempt at a flying lap got him to only within 0.448s of the leader.
Both drivers have been equipped with fresh power units for the weekend and enjoyed a clean hour of running, bar Perez running over a large piece of canvas that had found its way onto the Hangar straight. Verstappen also complained about a lack of grip on the hard tire at the start of the day, describing it as like driving on ice.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen dominated the Austrian Grand Prix after seeing off an early strategic challenge from Charles Leclerc.
The Red Bull driver got away easily from pole, and after swatting away a pass attempt from Leclerc around the outside of Turn 3 and then Turn 4, Verstappen set about building a comfortable lead.
Leclerc’s biggest challenge quickly became holding off Ferrari teammate Carlos Sainz, who radioed his team several times to suggest he be allowed to fight for second place, though he was rebuffed on each occasion.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen won the Austrian Grand Prix sprint after a fraught dice with teammate Sergio Perez on the first lap.
Perez got the better start from second on the grid and used his position on the inside of the first turn to snatch the lead. But the Mexican ran slightly deep and onto the wet exit curb, which cost him momentum.
Verstappen cut underneath him on the run to the Turn 3, to which Perez responded by crowding him to the edge of the track, forcing him to dip his right wheels onto the grass.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen lead a Red Bull front-row lockout ahead of Sergio Perez in qualifying for the Austrian Grand Prix sprint after the team’s chief rivals fumbled their way through the damp session.
Verstappen was in commanding form on the still-drying track following morning rain to beat Perez by 0.493s despite a wobble through Turn 3 that the team guessed cost him as much as 0.15s.
“The car was in a good window, good balance,” he said. “Very happy of course to be first.”
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