How Verstappen scored the best win of his F1 career and furthered Leclerc’s downfall

Not only was Max Verstappen’s romp to the spoils of glory in the Belgian Grand Prix last weekend the very finest work of his Formula 1 career, but his weekend-long performance should surely rank somewhere among the all-time great displays. Of the 1071 world championship races now held, only 14 have been won by a driver starting further back than he did at Spa.  

Adding to the case in favour, Verstappen’s mesmeric recovery came after he had absolutely dominated qualifying to top the order by six tenths, and despite needing to overcome a chunky grid penalty. Such was his command, despite having lined up down in 13th (after Pierre Gasly's late electrical system glitch caused a pitlane start), the defending champion was already contemplating the “good possibility” of seizing the victory on only lap eight of 44.

Spa – which will reprise its role in 2023 to cover for the South African GP being delayed a year – played host to the now traditional hybrid era litany of grid penalties. With the subsequent Dutch, Italian and Singapore rounds not offering an abundance of overtaking opportunities, eight drivers opted to take on enough new power unit elements for Belgium to exceed their quota for the season. They were duly sent marching to the back of the grid (or, in the case of Yuki Tsunoda, forced to contend with a pitlane start), but knowing there was at least the prospect of making up some of the lost ground.

Verstappen was among those pinged, courtesy of the new gearbox, energy store and control electronics for his Red Bull RB18. Boosting his chances was a box-fresh Honda engine to give him a helping hand on the 1.2-mile climb out of La Source towards Les Combes. Further aiding his cause was Gasly AlphaTauri AT03's electrical system briefly shut down before the formation lap. That meant the French racer would leave his grid box empty to gift Verstappen one spot. Nevertheless, the Dutch racer still had the small matter of nearest points rival Charles Leclerc starting immediately behind.

The Ferrari driver had similarly copped a load of penalties for a new internal combustion engine, turbo, exhaust, MGU-H, control electronics and gearbox – the legacy of his Spain and Azerbaijan blow-ups and the violent jolt delivered from his Paul Ricard smash.

The Scuderia had tried to play it cute, splitting up the replacement parts to try and exploit a vagary of the regulations in a bid to automatically start ahead of Verstappen, regardless of the qualifying result. While Leclerc did not get “a penalty” (singular) exceeding 15 places, the FIA intervened and totted up the score from all his reprimands to hand the Monegasque the back of the grid start the team had been trying to navigate.

Verstappen and Leclerc make strong starts from the rear end of the grid, the leading duo of the eight driver to take grid penalties

Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

It was clear neither driver would hang around on the opening laps as both Verstappen and Leclerc were put on the softest available C4 rubber for the start. Meanwhile, up ahead, all bar polesitter Carlos Sainz would ply their trade on mediums when the lights went out.

Verstappen’s launch was spot on. He swept past Valtteri Bottas in an instant, then outdragged a slow-starting Nicholas Latifi and tucked up the inside of a conservative Kevin Magnussen to gain three places into La Source alone. Alex Albon was dispatched through the first right-hand apex of Les Combes but the Williams would regain the position when Verstappen was forced into evasive action. This was to avoid Lance Stroll, who’d been robustly squeezed onto the gravel by his Aston Martin team-mate Sebastian Vettel. In the delay, Leclerc tried to hang it around the outside of the No Name left-hander but shrewdly backed out of the move as he ran out of room.

Leclerc was not at all rewarded for deciding that discretion was the better part of valour. As Stroll was again skipping over the gravel on the opening lap, he showered Verstappen in a cloud of muck. That led him to pull for a new visor tear-off, discarding his old one on the run to Blanchimont. The piece of plastic appeared to fly straight into the front-right brake duct of Leclerc’s chasing F1-75. While Fernando Alonso and Stroll also ripped their tear-off through this section, Ferrari was adamant it was the Red Bull racer’s detritus that was the one to become lodged. The onboard footage from both drivers certainly seems to corroborate that version.

"The first lap, with the car we had, you don't want to risk too much. Then it's even harder to stay out of trouble. People were going off in the gravel, coming back on the track. They are defending their spot. I was literally just trying to stay out of it" Max Verstappen

Verstappen continued his first-lap ascent, finally picking off Stroll for eighth place into the Bus Stop chicane when the safety car was called into play for the only time on Sunday afternoon.

“The first lap, with the car we had, you don't want to risk too much,” said Verstappen. “Then it's even harder to stay out of trouble. People were going off in the gravel, coming back on the track. They are defending their spot. I was literally just trying to stay out of it. But you also don't want to lose too much time. It was super-hectic, and so much dirt as well. We survived without damage.”

Back at the front, polesitter Sainz had put his soft tyres to good use to lead into the first corner unchallenged, his workload eased by second-starting Sergio Perez spinning his medium rubber off the line. The Mexican explained: “It was a very bad start. There was something with the clutch. As soon as I dropped, I just went straight into wheelspin and here it's very penalising. If you get a bad start here, it's probably one of the worst places to get it because the Tarmac is so rough.”

Perez makes a poor start and is engulfed by the chasing pack

Photo by: Steven Tee / Motorsport Images

As a result, Perez dropped to fifth behind third-starting Alonso and both underwhelming Mercedes. Lewis Hamilton tucked into Alonso’s slipstream to offset the W13’s draggy rear wing, which Silver Arrows team boss Toto Wolff likened to an “A380 Airbus”.

The seven-time champion threatened around the outside into the first part of Les Combes but with his former McLaren team-mate Alonso already over the inside kerb with nowhere else to go when he drew level, the Merc’s rear-right tyre clonked the Spaniard’s front-left tyre. Hamilton’s back axle was vaulted into the air and although the Briton initially rejoined, he was very slow and swiftly parked up with a loss of water pressure.

While Alonso’s stance would soften, his immediate reaction was: “What an idiot! Closing the door from the outside… we had a mega start, but this guy only knows how to drive starting first.” It was a rare mistake from Hamilton, one he would own, even if the stewards left it as an unpunished racing incident. Although, he would be handed a warning for not visiting the medical centre after the impact had triggered an alarm.

The yellow flags then morphed into a full safety car after Nicholas Latifi and Valtteri Bottas came to blows at the exit of the chicane, with the Alfa Romeo ending up in the gravel. This came as 15th-starting Esteban Ocon messed up the corner to run over the inside sausage kerb. It appeared to put the pursuing Latifi off line as he ran wide and kissed the gravel to pitch the Williams into a spin. Bottas was innocently collected and turned around to retire.

With the pack concertinaed and the speeds lowered, Leclerc’s brakes weren’t getting the cool air they needed. They began to smoke and as an incidental result of Verstappen cleaning his visor, his rival was forced to pit at the end of lap three for new mediums and to clear the blockage. The Red Bull driver’s eventual assessment of the unlikely set of circumstances was: “I hope it's not mine! It’s just super unlucky [for Leclerc]. You're always scared that it happens, especially when you’re in the pack because, especially on a track like this, you are taking [the visor tear-offs] off very quickly.”

The safety car peeled in at the end of lap four and Verstappen was a little slow away to leave Albon initially unchallenged. But reaffirming why a great deal of his qualifying prowess had been built on peerless, blistering runs through the twisty second sector, Verstappen expertly picked off the Thai-Brit around the outside of unlikely overtaking spot Rivage.

Hamilton clashes with Alonso, triggering the Mercedes driver's race retirement, and sparks up an old rivalry

Departing McLaren driver Daniel Ricciardo was a sitting duck into the Bus Stop before Sebastian Vettel was dispatched in similar circumstances next time around. With DRS then activated, Alonso was powerless to resist the 212mph V-max of the RB18 and Russell would only survive another tour. Just eight laps in, Verstappen was on the podium and could be confident that Perez ahead wouldn’t present the sternest of defences when their paths eventually crossed.

The split between the Red Bulls stood at 2.5s. But with Perez on the slower C3 rubber, the gap was only going one way. Verstappen eviscerated the difference and on lap 10 made a play for second place. But Perez didn’t give up the position immediately, holding station into Les Combes when a switcheroo was entirely possible. Verstappen unsurprisingly asked a question of the pitwall, labelling the time loss as “silly”.

On lap 12, he duly slipstreamed past. With Sainz pitting for a set of yellow-walled mediums on lap 11, Verstappen took the provisional lead. In the 4.35 miles immediately after overtaking his team-mate, Verstappen pulled 1.6s clear, then doubled it. Perez was called in to stop for more mediums on lap 14 – rejoining alongside Leclerc to briefly make contact at Les Combes.

"When Charles came to box for fastest lap, I was quite surprised. Ferrari always does strange strategies" Fernando Alonso

And of everything Verstappen did well that afternoon, it was arguably these laps when he shone brightest of all. Perez is a renowned tyre whisperer. A lacklustre qualifier he might be, but his mastery of the Pirellis has long been the 2022 Monaco winner’s trump card. Yet despite running mediums to Verstappen’s softs, it was the Mexican who had to pit first to shed his theoretically more durable rubber.

Even the Italian tyre manufacturer was taken by surprise at the eventual winner’s capacity to nurse his boots. The soft compound had been degrading more than expected even in the cool practice conditions on Friday and Saturday. Its rate of wear was only increased for the warmer GP. Yet Verstappen, who had actually used mediums to complete his FP2 race simulation so had little knowledge of the behaviour of the softs, could stretch the more fragile C4s longer than Perez with his harder C3s. “I think I'm always good on tyres,” reckoned Verstappen. “Maybe people don't look at it.”

The Pirellis charmed and Perez passed, Verstappen now knew the win was on to surpass his pre-race expectation that anything below a podium would be a disappointing return. He stopped for mediums at the end of lap 15 to return to the track 4.7s in arrears of Sainz.

Despite a strong start, Sainz was ultimately powerless to halt the Red Bull charge

Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

As the Ferrari’s mediums were now four laps old, Verstappen tore chunks out the gap and on lap 17 was on the F1-75’s rear. First place and the eventual win would effectively be decided when he powered up Eau Rouge and used DRS to leap past Sainz into Les Combes.

No doubt, the longer lap did go some way to exaggerating the potency of the RB18 – which the Ferrari drivers reckoned behaved as though it had been built specifically for the track. But with Perez’s average time 0.5s slower than Verstappen’s, this was a driver operating at their peak rather than solely enjoying the benefit of uncatchable machinery.

Worse for Ferrari, the team had stripped off its low-downforce Canada-spec rear wing after final practice in an attempt to limit the time it was bleeding away in the middle sector. And yet Verstappen still remained devastating on the run from Les Combes to the exit of Stavelot with his Red Bull, even though it was in the more slippery state of tune.

Could the Scuderia do anything to blemish Verstappen’s perfect day? It certainly attempted to add a blot to the copybook by pitting Leclerc on lap 42 for a set of softs as part of a concerted effort to rob the championship leader of a bonus point for fastest lap. The service was fine enough, but the strategy call proved immediately questionable when Leclerc resumed behind Alonso, having ceded fifth place.

As the Alpine had the legs with its warmer tyres, Leclerc lost clean air and with it, his tilt at three purple sectors. Only on the final lap into Les Combes could the Ferrari dive back past for fifth at the line. Alonso’s typically box-office assessment was: “When Charles came to box for fastest lap, I was quite surprised. Ferrari always does strange strategies.”

Yet, that fifth would swiftly become sixth when Leclerc was handed a 5s penalty for having exceeded the 50mph pitlane speed limit by 0.6mph. The cause of the excessive haste? A faulty sensor that had been damaged by the very early brake duct temperature spike incidentally initiated by Verstappen.

In any other season, it would surely seem unbelievable. But that type of misfortune in 2022, at least, almost seems par for the course for Leclerc.

As the timing screens corrected to reflect the reprimand, Verstappen’s celebrations were already well under way. After drifting out of the final corner of his favourite circuit, his 29th and best F1 victory had been secured by a crushing 17.8s, Perez eventually completed a Red Bull 1-2 – having passed Sainz with a smart dummy on the Kemmel Straight on lap 21 before the pair rounded out their day on the unfavoured hard tyre.

Verstappen leads home Red Bull's fourth 1-2 of the season

Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images

Verstappen praised the “rocket ship” car as he pulled into the pitlane. Christian Horner recognised a performance that had left his driver in “a class of [his] own”. The team boss would add: “Max had to navigate his way through the pack, and he did that very, very efficiently over the first couple of laps. He hit the front far quicker than we could have ever expected.

“The pace that we had with both Max and Checo was enough to easily pass Carlos and bring home probably one of the most dominant performances that we've had as a team since either 2010 or 2013. He's excelled here in the past and today, he has basically smashed it out of the park. I mean, he did a lap on mediums that still stood as the fastest lap.”

"One of the most dominant performances that we've had as a team since either 2010 or 2013" Christian Horner

Verstappen heads to his second home race in a row at Zandvoort with an emphatic 93-point lead, having now won an incredible nine of the 14 races this term. The Belgian-Dutch racer is directly ahead of Perez too, with Leclerc slipping to third in the standings by a further five points.

The tighter confines of the Netherland seaside circuit should allow the chasm in pace between Red Bull and Ferrari that was on display at Spa to converge. But as for the title, that is now surely only heading one way.

With nine wins from 14 races, Verstappen looks untouchable on his way to the 2022 F1 title

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images