Max Verstappen won the Las Vegas Grand Prix ahead Lando Norris in P2 and George Russell in P3.
Photo: RacePictures.
How it happened
At the start Lando Norris aggressively cut across to cover off Max Verstappen.This move saw him understeer off the track on the outside of Turn 1, and Verstappen take the lead and George Russell take P3.
Further back, Liam Lawson would bang wheels with Oscar Piastri, going for an optimistic move on the inside of Turn 1. Gabriel Bortoleto’s, though, was more ambitious. From further back he overshot his braking point, and slammed into the side of Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll. The debris from the incident would trigger a Virtual Safety Car and a dangerous on-track moment with the marshals.
Photo: RacePictures.
Verstappen in full control, Ferrari on a mission
While Andrea Kimi Antonelli jumped the start, – for which he was handed a five-second penalty – Lewis Hamilton chose to jump positions instead, shooting up from P19 to 12th, as Haas rookie Oliver Bearman went from P14 to P18.
Although Russell sought to attack Verstappen in the early laps, the Dutch driver nursed his tyres, whilst the Briton over used his. Verstappen was then able to grow his lead, and push Mercedes to try an undercut on the Dutchman. After Russell stopped for hards on lap 19 Norris took back P2.
Hamilton kept making moves all the way to P9 by lap 21, as Piastri, who’d been overtaken by Charles Leclerc, and demoted to P8, was able to make his way back to P6. With Hamilton making it up to P7, Leclerc was also able to take P3 from Carlos Sainz.
Photo: RacePictures.
Verstappen holds the lead
The race then started to resume its natural order, with Russell behind Leclerc, who was yet to make his pit stop, and Norris trailing the McLaren driver. When Verstappen made his 3.0 seconds pit stop, he was able to maintain the lead ahead of Russell, preserving a 1.3 gap to his Mercedes driver, which would grow to two seconds after two laps.
Piastri ran in P7, but the trio of cars ahead were yet to make a pit stop, which put him – virtually – in P4, giving him chances to potentially vie for the last podium place as the gap to teammate Norris was only of 12.5 seconds at the time.
Photo: RacePictures.
Verstappen seals Las Vegas GP win
Norris pushed the throttle and started to eat away at Russell’s gap, until making the overtake on lap 34, encouraged by race engineer Will Joseph who revealed the actual target was Verstappen. However, with 16 laps to go the Red Bull Racing driver’s lead was of 5.5 seconds, meaning Norris would have to gain around three and a half tenths per lap.
Verstappen was warned of Norris’ intentions by race engineer Gianpiero Lambiase, who also informed him of the corners in which Norris was making the most damage. After that, Verstappen pumpedout two consecutive fastest laps that saw the gaps rise to nearly six seconds. Norris then brought the difference back down to 5.6s, which would would only grow by the time the chequered flag flew.
As Piastri attempted to mount an attack on Antonelli, Leclerc joined in the fray, and started putting the pressure on the Australian. The Italian driver would manage to fend off the McLaren driver’s attcks, albeit if his 5 second time penalty for jumping the start meant that he would finish behind both in P5.
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