@RedBullRacing’s @Max33Verstappen storms to dominant #AustrianGP victory. #F1

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen cruised to a dominant Austrian GP victory ahead of Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas who was second and McLaren’s Lando Norris completing the top three.

 

 

The Dutchman’s advantage was so big, he had enough time to pit again and to clinch the bonus fastest lap point, whilst Bottas benefited from being allowed passed by team-mate Lewis Hamilton in a Mercedes team order and Norris overtook his fellow British compatriot to claim the final podium place despite picking up a five-second time penalty from his early incident with Red Bull’s Sergio Perez.

 

When the 71-lap Austrian GP began, Norris got a slightly better run off the line, which forced Verstappen to swing across and cover the run to the first corner’s uphill right hander, where he held first place and pulled clear.

 

In the group behind, Hamilton battled Perez for third place at the turn four downhill right, shortly before the race was stabilised due to the deployment of the safety car from Alpine F1 Team’s Esteban Ocon who stopped with a broken right front on the run-down between turns three and four between Haas F1 Team’s Mick Schumacher and Alfa Romeo Racing’s Antonio Giovinazzi at the uphill tight third corner.

 

 

The race returned to green on lap four, where Verstappen was waiting until he was clear of the final corner before planting down the throttle allowing Perez to get a run-on Norris on the outside of turn one.

 

The Red Bull driver took to the run-off exiting the turn and fell back behind Norris, with the Mercedes pairing swarming as they sped down to turn three.

 

Perez went for the move around the outside Norris at turn four but was edged out wide and ended up into the gravel trap, which saw the Briton later hit with a five-second time penalty, as the Red Bull dropped to tenth, and Hamilton and Bottas went by.

 

Verstappen was 1.9 seconds clear at the end of the initial full tour and rapidly extended the gap to nearly ten seconds with a series of fastest laps in the low 1:09’s bracket, as Norris was under pressure from Hamilton until the 20^th lap.

 

Hamilton closed in again after Norris at first kept him behind, despite McLaren’s concern that his pace in the mid 1:09’s was hurting his left-rear tyre, and the former used DRS assistance to overtake the McLaren on the run to turn four after initially attacking on the outside at turn three.

 

Verstappen continued to extend his lead to over 12 seconds by the time Hamilton came in for his stop on lap 31, where the Mercedes swapped the C4 medium compounds to the hards, which Red Bull did for Verstappen on the following tour.

 

After rejoining comfortably in-front, Verstappen continued to build his gap at the beginning of his second stint, which fastly became a solid advantage as Hamilton continued to struggle for grip due to sustaining damage to the left-rear aerodynamic surfaces on his F1 W12 EQ Performance racer, which Mercedes reported to Bottas was due to running over the final corner exit kerbs.

 

As Verstappen bolted to over 23 seconds clear out-front, Hamilton became under pressure from team-mate Bottas, who moved ahead of Norris when the McLaren driver served his five second timed-penalty when the duo pitted for hards the tour before Hamilton.

 

Mercedes initially told Bottas not to attack Hamilton as they reviewed the situation, but when it was 20 laps remaining, the Finn was given the order that he was free to race, with Norris only a second behind the Mercedes driver.

 

Then Mercedes opted to switch the order of it’s cars, with Hamilton allowing Bottas to get past on the inside of the third corner on the 52^nd tour, whilst Norris closed in on the reigning world champion as Bottas moved clear.

 

Norris attacked Hamilton two laps later as he looked to the outside of the Mercedes into turn four but was fended off there before he darted ahead on the inside of the fast-sweeping left turn six to find his way back into the podium position, with Hamilton stopping for a second time at the end of that lap.

 

Red Bull brought Verstappen in for a final stop at the end of the 60^th lap, as the Dutchman claimed the fastest lap on a 1:06.200 – having already held the honour even before his second pit-stop during a brief swapping of times with Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz and Hamilton just before coming in for a second set of the white side-walled C3 hards.

 

Norris hunted down Bottas to the line, but was two seconds behind, with Verstappen clinching the Austrian GP victory by 17.973 seconds, back-to-back wins at the Red Bull Ring and extending his World Driver’s Championship lead to 32 points.

 

Hamilton wound up fourth, in-front of Perez, who came home fifth, but ended the Grand Prix in sixth place due to a pair of five second timed-penalties for twice tangling with Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc in similar situations, and on the initial occasion at the same spot, as his incident with McLaren’s Norris.

 

The second occurrence between Perez and Leclerc happened with the latter attempting to around the outside of the Red Bull at turn six before he was pushed into the gravel, after which Perez ran clear and passed McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo.

 

Perez tried to build enough of a gap to hold onto fifth place despite his added-on time to come, running very close to Hamilton by the end, but Sainz’ late surge after running a long initial stint on the harder compounds from tenth on the grid meant the Ferrari driver was within 10 seconds to claim fifth at the chequered flag.

 

Sainz was given the all-clear to pass team-mate Leclerc as the Monegasque-youngster failed in several attempts to pass Ricciardo’s MCL35M racer, with the Australian taking seventh place and Leclerc in eighth.

 

Scuderia AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly crossed the line in ninth place, whilst Alpine F1 Team’s Fernando Alonso grabbed the final point on offer to deny George Russell and Williams their first championship point, with the Briton losing several places on lap one starting eighth.

 

Russell resisted the pressure from the Spaniard in a thrilling fight before the Alpine driver got passed with three tours remaining – using DRS assistance to get onto the inside of the FW43B after going deep defending at the third corner.

 

On the last lap, Russell’s 11^th place was also under-threat from Alfa Romeo Racing’s Kimi Raikkonen and Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel, who was on a charge running a two-stop strategy.

 

When Russell and Raikkonen locked up at the fourth corner, Vettel brought his Mercedes-powered AMR21 racer alongside and ahead of his former Ferrari team-mate, who ran into the left-hand side of the German as Russell pulled clear.

 

Both Raikkonen and Vettel went off into the gravel trap behind turn five, where they retired from the race.

 

The second AlphaTauri of Yuki Tsunoda finished 12^th and ahead of Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll who ended the Grand Prix 13^th and the aforementioned Giovinazzi 14^th.

 

The other Williams of Nicholas Latifi came 15^th and in-front of the aforementioned Raikkonen and Vettel who were 16^th and 17^th on the classification as the Haas F1 Team pairing of Mick Schumacher and Nikita Mazepin brought up the rear and two laps down from the lead.

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2021 Austrian GP – The Top Three

 

 

2021 Austrian GP Winner – Max Verstappen, #33, Red Bull Racing-Honda, RB16B:

“Incredible to be honest, the car was unreal. On every tyre set we put on; it was really enjoyable to drive. A great effort by the whole team, these two weeks here have been incredible.”

 

2^nd Place – Valtteri Bottas, #77, Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team, F1 W12 EQ Performance:

“As a team, we got some decent points considering the gap we had to Red Bull on pure pace.”

 

3^rd Place – Lando Norris, #4, McLaren Racing-Mercedes, MCL35M:

“It was a good race, it was exciting. I’m disappointed because we should have been in second place. He went off the track himself, we didn’t push him, so I’m frustrated. I could keep up with [Bottas] even in the dirty air, it’s nice to know we can be there – it’s the first race in many years we’ve actually been racing a Mercedes and a Red Bull.”

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Formula 1 VTB Grosser Preis Von Osterreich 2021 Race Results Classification (71 Laps)

 

POS	NO	DRIVER	CAR	LAPS	TIME/RETIRED	PTS
1	33	Max Verstappen	RED BULL RACING HONDA	71	1:23:54.543	26
2	77	Valtteri Bottas	MERCEDES	71	+17.973s	18
3	4	Lando Norris	MCLAREN MERCEDES	71	+20.019s	15
4	44	Lewis Hamilton	MERCEDES	71	+46.452s	12
5	55	Carlos Sainz	FERRARI	71	+57.144s	10
6	11	Sergio Perez	RED BULL RACING HONDA	71	+57.915s	8
7	3	Daniel Ricciardo	MCLAREN MERCEDES	71	+60.395s	6
8	16	Charles Leclerc	FERRARI	71	+61.195s	4
9	10	Pierre Gasly	ALPHATAURI HONDA	71	+61.844s	2
10	14	Fernando Alonso	ALPINE RENAULT	70	+1 lap	1
11	63	George Russell	WILLIAMS MERCEDES	70	+1 lap	0
12	22	Yuki Tsunoda	ALPHATAURI HONDA	70	+1 lap	0
13	18	Lance Stroll	ASTON MARTIN MERCEDES	70	+1 lap	0
14	99	Antonio Giovinazzi	ALFA ROMEO RACING FERRARI	70	+1 lap	0
15	6	Nicholas Latifi	WILLIAMS MERCEDES	70	+1 lap	0
16	7	Kimi Räikkönen	ALFA ROMEO RACING FERRARI	70	+1 lap	0
17	5	Sebastian Vettel	ASTON MARTIN MERCEDES	69	DNF	0
18	47	Mick Schumacher	HAAS FERRARI	69	+2 laps	0
19	9	Nikita Mazepin	HAAS FERRARI	69	+2 laps	0
NC	31	Esteban Ocon	ALPINE RENAULT	0	DNF	0

 

 

 

https://www.formula1.com/en/results.html/2021/races/1071/austria.html

 

Click here for the Formula 1 World Driver’s (Top 10) and Constructors Championship Standings

 

Round ten of the 2021 FIA Formula One World Championship returns to the legendary Silverstone Circuit in Silverstone, Northamptonshire, United Kingdom, for the Formula 1 Pirelli British Grand Prix 2021 from Friday July 16-Sunday July 18.