How Verstappen overcame his and Red Bull’s errors to bounce back in double-quick time

Max Verstappen reckoned, albeit tongue in cheek, that he would need “45 races” to make up the lost ground to Charles Leclerc having retired from the Australian Grand Prix in early April. No, it wasn’t a mix-up with ‘four to five races’ in what might be a rejected premise for a Two Ronnies sketch. He said a full 45. Remarkably, the forecast proved pessimistic. For just three rounds after the Melbourne malady that left him 46 points adrift, the defending champion summitted the 2022 Formula 1 drivers’ standings for the first time.

That was the ultimate prize for winning a frenetic Spanish Grand Prix on a day when rival Leclerc copped his share of unreliability in the title fight between the pair.

Barcelona gets a bad rap for producing damp squibs, but the 66-lapper last weekend proved particularly entertaining as Ferrari again battled Red Bull. However, the race was merely the climax rather than the be-all and end-all of a three-day narrative about how the momentum swung back and forth between the two teams.

The long straights and flat-out sweepers of Saudi Arabia and Miami had so clearly favoured the top-end performance of the Red Bull-badged Honda power unit. Ferrari’s low-speed acceleration, meanwhile, had come to the fore in Australia. That left the Scuderia as the on-paper favourite coming into a round at difficult-to-pass Barcelona. And with fiddly Monaco to follow before the high-speed demands of Baku and Montreal, there was a sense that Ferrari had to get its next two races right to keep it in the lead of the constructors’ fight.

That hopefulness was bolstered by the F1-75 debuting its first upgrade package of the campaign, courtesy of a new specification floor and rear to improve aerodynamic performance. The RB18 received a more modest treatment with an adjusted floor only.

In that positive context for Ferrari fans, the trends from second practice made for grim reading. The Prancing Horse's race simulations on the medium C2 compound Pirelli were wildly adrift of the metronomic Red Bull pace. Worse still, the exaggerated tyre degradation that had hurt Leclerc so dear in Imola and in Miami was back for more. When Ferrari therefore used FP3 to dial in its set-up and showed improvements by the stopwatch and better tyre management, while Red Bull focused on one-lap pace, everything converged.

Leclerc grabbed a dramatic pole after a Q3 spin, but Verstappen still edged the pre-race predictions

Photo by: Steven Tee / Motorsport Images

Leclerc bouncing back from his spin in Q3 to land a clear pole didn’t hurt the anticipation for the race. The ground-effect cars can follow more closely in the main to help ease the passing challenge presented by Barcelona to keep Verstappen very much in the game. Plus, the Monegasque has made nailing qualifying his calling card so far this term meaning he was expected to do well on Saturday. In return, the expectation was that once more Verstappen would run him close in a race that could go either way.

It was Verstappen who enjoyed the marginally better launch from second on the grid, but he was trying to the put the power down through a scrubbed set of softs that broke traction and forced him to short shift. Leclerc, by contrast, was on a fresh set that he hooked up well. That gave him just enough breathing space to pull across to the inside and keep the chasing Dutch racer and his healthy Honda engine at bay when the field poured into Turn 1.

Leclerc put his new rubber to good use to lead by almost a second at the end of the opening tour, even if he dropped a tenth next time around. Lewis Hamilton and Kevin Magnussen were able to trundle back to the pits with their respective punctures following clumsy opening lap contact at Turn 3 to prevent a safety car. Unimpeded, on lap three Leclerc could run four tenths quicker than Verstappen to critically drop his pursuer out of DRS range when the overtaking aid was promptly enabled.

"It was very gusty out there today. One lap it felt all stable and then the next lap suddenly you could have more oversteer" Max Verstappen

Ferrari was unable to call on Carlos Sainz to pile the pressure on Verstappen. The home hero had been at sixes and sevens releasing his clutch to stutter off the line and fall from third to fifth behind fourth-starting George Russell aboard the heavily updated Mercedes W13 and Sergio Perez. Having struggled all weekend to tame a “snappier” rear axle, Sainz was then caught out by a gust – despite the scorching temperatures, it was surprisingly blowy on race day – at Turn 4 that allowed the car to swap ends. He was left to pick his way through the gravel. The Spaniard returned to the track way down in 11th and was lucky not to collect Yuki Tsunoda.

That spill wasn’t just a reflection of Sainz’s poor form in the early part of this season. The wind caught out Verstappen at the same place two laps later as the RB18 broke out from underneath him. Through unreliability, Red Bull has let Verstappen down on several occasions so far in 2022, but this was a rare case of the roles being reversed and the driver dropping the ball.

“I suddenly had a lot of tailwind, so I just lost the rear,” explained Verstappen. “It really caught me by surprise because I didn't feel like I was actually braking later or throwing more speed into the corner. But it was very gusty out there today. Like, one lap it felt all stable and then the next lap suddenly you could have more oversteer in places.”

Verstappen's spin dropped him behind Perez and Russell to start an intriguing middle stint of the race

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

He resumed in fourth behind his team-mate, who in turn was breathing down the neck of Russell. Perez had a sniff on laps eight and nine but thought better of it when the Mercedes took a defensive line into the first corner. Next time around, Perez was much more aggressive, but Russell wouldn’t budge, and the Mexican couldn’t find a way past the lap after either.

Unable to capitalise and with Verstappen risking his tyres further by sliding around in the dirty air, so came the first instruction to Perez to “let Max have a shot”. He requested another tour to get the job done but that was denied by the pitwall with the understanding that “we’ll pay you back later”. On the short downhill run into Turn 6, Verstappen was released to take down Russell.

Then came the latest case of RB18 temperamentality. The car that had retired in Bahrain and Australia before struggling with overheating in Miami had forced Verstappen to abort his final Q3 lap for pole when the DRS failed to activate on the main straight. Red Bull had therefore decided to replace the flap pivot pins and actuator to amend the issue, which is ostensibly why Verstappen didn’t leave his garage to form on the grid until the last second – although there is speculation his delay was actually to resolve a dip in fuel temperature.

Either way, the new parts didn’t put paid to the issue. Verstappen thumbed the button to open the rear wing flap, but it immediately slammed back shut. It did this time and time again, as team and driver worked to initiate DRS when Verstappen was on the kerbs, off the kerbs, at the activation line, well beyond the marker. Nothing seemed to provide a consistent fix.

“That was extremely painful,” said Verstappen. “Sometimes it would open, like almost halfway on the straight or not at all. I could have shouted back on the radio something, but there is nothing you can do. I'm not stupid, once you get the light and the activation beep, then you press the paddle, if it doesn't open, there's clearly an issue.

“I've spammed it like 50 times at one point on the straight and it's just not opening. I tried all different kinds, but it was just malfunctioning.”

With Russell still ahead, he and Verstappen pitted for mediums on lap 13. As they picked up the battle, the Red Bull driver had to deftly catch a slide after clipping the inside kerb at Turn 8. DRS finally stayed open for Verstappen on lap 24 to allow him to shoot to the inside and past Russell into Turn 1. But Russell hung on around the outside as the track snaked left then right for the next two corners as the battle hit its peak. The Mercedes driver squeezed his foe to the edge of the track and beyond. Verstappen naturally kept his foot planted but couldn't make the move stick and remained in third.

Russell pulled off some resolute defending against Verstappen to delay the Red Bull driver's charge

Photo by: Steve Etherington / Motorsport Images

“The fight itself, I think was really cool,” he said. “I look back at it and I'll smile now. At the time, of course, I was a little bit frustrated. But it was a really good and tough battle.”

As entertaining as the battle was, Leclerc had escaped into what appeared to be an unimpeachable lead. Ferrari looked to have delivered a masterstroke by heading out for that last race simulation in FP3. In the intense heat, tyre degradation seemed to be giving Leclerc a miss as he built an advantage of 16s over Perez before the Red Bull pitted.

Not only did he have pace in hand, pumping in a string of laps six tenths quicker than his potential challengers, but Leclerc could stretch his soft rubber all the way to lap 21. Then the Maranello pitcrew fitted a set of medium tyres in just 2.2s to release Leclerc into a lead of 5.7s over Russell. Leclerc soon doubled that advantage in what was shaping up to be a foregone conclusion.

But after all the unreliability to hit Verstappen this season, now it was Leclerc’s turn. On lap 27, on the approach to the higher-speed Turn 9 right-hander, there was a little chirrup from the wastegate as the Ferrari engine shutdown.

"Let's say that I feel better after this weekend than I felt after the last two weekends [in Imola and Miami]. Of course, there's this issue that we've had on the car and I'm very disappointed. But on the other hand, I think there's plenty of positive signs" Charles Leclerc

“No, no, no! What happened? I think the turbo exploded” came Leclerc’s immediate reaction. He cruised the F1-75 to the garage and was withdrawn from an almost certain victory. The issue was so sudden that, as per team boss Mattia Binotto: “We learned it first from Charles going onto the radio, and then from the engineers looking at the data.”

While the engine was sent back to Modena for a full strip down to identify the true cause, Leclerc departed Spain oddly upbeat: “Let's say that I feel better after this weekend than I felt after the last two weekends [in Imola and Miami]. Of course, there's this issue that we've had on the car and I'm very disappointed. But on the other hand, I think there's plenty of positive signs other than that – our qualifying pace, the new package works as expected, our race pace and tyre management. In those situations, I think it's good to also look at the positives, and there are plenty today.”

In the time it took Leclerc to crawl back to the pitlane, Russell and Verstappen had closed to appear in the same camera shot as the Ferrari for the first time since the Red Bull’s Turn 4 excursion 18 laps previously. The victory that had looked out of reach was now up for grabs, and Verstappen tried to grasp it straight away by lunging at the Silver Arrow into Turn 1 thanks to a working DRS flap. But Russell continued to defend stoutly.

Leclerc's straightforward victory bid imploded with an engine failure which Ferrari is yet to understand

Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images

With Verstappen unable to pass on track, Red Bull made the move happen off it. He was put on an undercut strategy and pitted for a set of softs to lock into a three-stopper.

Perez was now right behind Russell, and with Red Bull releasing Verstappen so quickly, the horse had bolted. The Brit was kept out on track rather than match the champion’s strategy and almost certainly lose the track position he had fought so well to retain.

In the transition from Turn 14 into 15 at the end of lap 30, Russell ran just a fraction wide to give a DRS-assisted Perez the tow he needed to sweep by on the outside come the 100-metre board into Turn 1 and take the race lead. For six tours, Mercedes kept its driver out on ageing C2s before finally swapping Russell onto a fresh set of the mediums.

Red Bull responded by matching its German rival and duly pitted Perez next time around, also for the yellow-walled rubber. Verstappen, having earlier completed a millimetre-perfect outside pass on Valtteri Bottas at Turn 12, was clear to head the field by 16s. That was until two-thirds distance, when what Pirelli had predicted to be a two-stop race became a three-stopper. The leading Red Bull hit the pits yet again to take on one last set of mediums.

Perez had regained track position, but Verstappen was now banging in times 1.5s faster per lap to again require the pitwall to intervene. A 5s margin had been fully eroded come lap 48, at which point the second dispiriting radio call of the day buzzed in Perez’s ear. Despite Verstappen having the pace advantage to get by on merit and having put himself behind with that earlier mistake, the message landed: “You’re on a different strategy to Max. He is quicker. Let him through.”

Given it was only the sixth round of a record-equalling 22-race calendar now that F1 will not source a replacement for the axed Russian GP, many perceived it to be much too early in the season for Red Bull to be imposing such clear orders. Even if Perez’s number-two status in the team has long been tacitly accepted by observers and that second place wouldn’t have been enough by one point for Verstappen to take the lead of the championship.

“That’s very unfair, but OK,” replied a compliant Perez, who hadn’t forgotten the earlier deal he had struck with the team when he first let his stablemate past and was then told he’d be paid back soon enough. He wouldn’t be, at least not in Spain.

Perez had aggrievances with Red Bull over its team orders to let Verstappen overtake him

Photo by: Carl Bingham / Motorsport Images

On lap 49, as Russell sat an unthreatening 10s in arrears, Perez backed off into Turn 4 and Verstappen was promoted into first place for the final time. Perez was then brought into the pits for a final 13-lap dash to the finish on softs with the mission to nick the point for fastest lap that at that time was going to be collected by Hamilton.

The seven-time champion, having called on Mercedes to retire its updated W13 following the brush with Magnussen, was unable to respond as he (like Russell) had to massively lift and coast to keep a hold of spiking engine temperatures and conceded fourth to Sainz late on. But in a somewhat familiar Hamilton performance – starting off grumpy before absolutely excelling with an immense recovery drive – he delivered in line with his stablemate as the lower-speed Barcelona enabled Mercedes to assess its new parts and massively combat the porpoising that has plagued it so far in 2022.

Third-placed Russell rallied his team: “We have turned a page. I feel like this is probably the start of our season now. It's been a season of problem solving, as opposed to trying to find more performance and bring more performance to the car. I think we've now finally solved our issue. We're six races behind but there's no reason why we can't claw this back.”

The triumph arrived while Red Bull and Verstappen go in search of a first perfect weekend of the year, having dropped the ball with reliability. This might suggest that when team and driver get everything right, they could devastatingly disappear up the road

Two places ahead and with his team-mate out of the equation, Verstappen crafted a cushion of 13s at the flag to chalk his third consecutive victory and move six points clear of Leclerc as Red Bull sprung into a 26-point lead over Ferrari. Verstappen, at the site of his first F1 win on his debut for Red Bull in 2016, moved level with Juan Manuel Fangio on 24 world championship GP victories.

What started out as a recovery run for Verstappen following a second retirement in three races in Australia is now a fully-fledged title challenge. The reigning champion has notched victory in every race he’s finished in 2022. In Spain, as at Imola, those successes arrived at tracks that should have more naturally suited the traits of the Ferrari.

And yet the triumph arrived while Red Bull and Verstappen must still go in search of a first perfect weekend of the year, having dropped the ball with reliability most of all. This might suggest that when team and driver get everything right, they could devastatingly disappear up the road. But given how imperious Leclerc looked aboard the revised F1-75 prior to his Barcelona retirement, albeit after Verstappen had made his wind-induced blunder to ease the pressure, the Prancing Horse can keep pace with the bull. It must do that in Monaco to keep the title fight as tantalisingly wide open as possible.

Can Leclerc and Ferrari fight back in Monaco?

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images