Absolute in sprint races, Max Verstappen achieved his ninth victory in the format with ease this Saturday at the Miami GP. Starting from pole position, the three-time champion was not even bothered by second place, Charles Leclerc. His RBR teammate, Sergio Pérez, almost lost the podium to Daniel Ricciardo, but recovered and came in third place.
In addition to Max with his nine victories in 14 sprint races, held since the format’s debut in 2021, only Valtteri Bottas (Sauber) has won more: twice. But Saturday’s victory was far from complicated for the Dutchman, who dominated from start to finish.
Not very busy, the main highlight of the race was the dispute between Lewis Hamilton and Kevin Magnussen for eighth place, the last one to give up points in this format: the seven-time champion managed to cross the finish line in the scoring zone while his rival received 20 seconds in punishment for leaving of the track.
However, Hamilton’s eighth place was short-lived: he was punished with a drive through (passing through the pit lane) for accelerating in the pits and, for failing to comply with the sanction, had 20 seconds added to his race time. As a result, the seven-time champion fell to 16th and Yuki Tsunoda inherited the original position.
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The classification that defines the starting positions of the main race of the Miami GP, this Sunday, will take place this Saturday at 5pm – Brasília time. ge tracks everything in real time
Pole Verstappen remained ahead of Leclerc, but his colleague, Pérez, was not so lucky and was overtaken by Daniel Ricciardo, originally in fourth place.
Right behind, an incident triggered the yellow flag at the end of the opening lap: Lance Stroll (7th) and Lewis Hamilton (12th) squeezed Fernando Alonso, who was in eighth place, and caused a puncture in his tire.
The three out-of-control cars hit Lando Norris, who stopped in the run-off area after starting ninth. The safety car closed the track on lap 4, with the British McLaren and Stroll out.
Pérez regained his original position on the fifth lap, overtaking Ricciardo. The Australian from RB even had to defend himself from an approach from Carlos Sainz, fifth placed. Meanwhile, Leclerc saw the disadvantage for leader Verstappen growing more and more; from 0s8 when the race resumed, to 1s3 on the next lap and more than 2s1 on lap nine.
Despite pressure from Sainz at the end of the race, Ricciardo managed to stay in fourth place, achieving his best result of the season.
After contact at the start, Hamilton was in ninth place on the fourth lap, when the safety car left the track. The four-time champion then approached Kevin Magnussen to try to enter the scoring zone; but the first boat, on lap 8, had no effect.
Hamilton threatened Magnussen again on lap 11. At this point, the race management issued a 10s penalty to the Haas driver for defending himself from the Mercedes rival on the outside of the track and spreading the car over the Brit, causing a major collision. light.
Another clash between the pair on lap 14 ended not only with Magnussen remaining in eighth place, but with RB’s YUki Tsunoda taking advantage of the gap to overtake the Mercedes veteran; passing on the outside, Hamilton overtook the Dane, who cut through the run-off area again to take the lead in turn 11. For that, another 10s for the Haas driver.
Later, however, Magnussen would let Tsunoda and Hamilton pass him. On the last lap, the seven-time champion passed the RB driver. However, he ended up being punished with 20s for accelerating in the pit lane and not complying with the drive through he received for the infraction. With that, he dropped to 16th and gave up eighth place to Tsunoda.
