Tyre strategy figured prominently in Sunday’s Dutch Grand Prix.
ZANDVOORT, The Netherlands—Max Verstappen took advantage of a last-minute safety car situation to pass Lewis Hamilton with 12 laps to go to take his 10th victory of the season Sunday at the Dutch Grand Prix. George Russell in the Mercedes was second, with Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc finishing in third.
Max Verstappen: Yeah, it was not a straightforward race, but we had to push the whole race. Of course, with the virtual safety car making the right calls, it’s always a bit of a question mark, but it worked out really well once we got back to the soft tyres. We had great pace again.
Verstappen had an excellent start and led until the first round of pitstops. That is when Alpine driver Fernando Alonso began a trend by putting on hard tyres, and many others followed. Verstappen lost the lead to Hamilton as the Dutchman took advantage following a virtual safety car period when Alpha Tauri’s Yuki Tsunoda parked his car on lap 48. Hamilton pitted soon afterward, and many realized that the Briton had the fresher tyres and could close in on Verstappen, who had weaker rubber after pitting earlier.
But that all changed on lap 51 when the second and final retirement of the race occurred. Alfa Romeo’s Valtteri Bottas pulled his car to the side of the main straight, setting up the only safety car period of the race.
Once again, the drivers pulled into the pits for soft tyres, but Hamilton decided to stay out, and that cost him the chance for his first win of the season. When the restart occurred with 12 laps to go, Hamilton was quickly passed by Verstappen, followed by teammate Russell and Leclerc. All three of them came into the pits for softs and quickly took advantage of the situation, leaving Hamilton no chance but to end up finishing in fourth.
“Before that safety car, I thought it was ok to the end with the hard tyres even though we were a bit slower. But then, of course, the safety car came out,” Verstappen explained. “I had a good run in the restart; we had a bit more top speed, which helps to attack into turn 1. From there onwards, we had really good balance in the car again.”
Red Bull’s other driver, Sergio Perez, finished fifth, but Carlos Sainz had an awful day in his Ferrari. First, the Spaniard had a slow pit stop on lap 15 when the rear left tyre fitter was not present, which pushed him from third to 11th. However, only laps from the finish, Sainz was penalized for an unsafe release when his Ferrari came out unexpectedly in front of Alonso in the pit lane. Sainz ended up eighth.
Alpine, though, achieved double points for the second race in a row. Alonso finished in sixth and Esteban Ocon in ninth. McLaren’s Lando Norris was seventh, and Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll finished tenth.
Verstappen now leads the world driver’s championship by 109 points over Leclerc, and his Red Bull squad leads Ferrari by 135 for the Constructor’s title. For Verstappen, it is his second win in a row on his home circuit. “It’s always special to win your home Grand Prix,” he said. “This year, I had to work for it even more. It was an incredible weekend. Happy we got the Dutch Grand Prix.”
