Spanish GP: Two-time defending World Champion Max Verstappen continued to find his brilliance in the 2023 season of Formula 1 as he added another race under his belt on June 4, Sunday. Red Bull driver led from lights out to the chequered flag and clinched his 5th win out of 7 races this season. Meanwhile, home favourite Fernando Alonso, who secured multiple podiums this season, endured his worst finish of the year, coming home 7th.
Polesitter Verstappen and his Red Bull looked unstoppable and fast throughout the 66-lap race. He was challenged by Ferrari's Carlos Sainz for a brief period when the race began on turn 1 of lap 1, but the Dutchman fended the other Spaniard Sainz to keep his lead intact. Notably, the revitalised Mercedes took the other two podiums, with 7-time champion Lewis Hamilton coming second in front of George Russell.
Verstappen's teammate and title rival in the initial phase of the season, Sergio Perez secured fourth and conceded more points in the championship battle. The fastest lap was also secured by Verstappen. After registering the win, Verstappen was full of pleasure for the car. "It's such a big pleasure to drive a car like this. And it displayed again today. We were on different tyre strategies today and mostly I was on the right one! And to win here is incredible," Verstappen said after the win.
Meanwhile, Hamilton heaped praise on Mercedes' progress. “This is what we were hoping for when we brought the upgrades. I mean we’d hoped for more in the sense of a bigger step. The actual performance step they told us was under two-tenths, so it wasn’t like a... That’s still good, not the step that everyone is working so hard towards, but we’ll still take it," Hamilton said.
“But this result is definitely what we were working towards. This is amazing and it’s down to all the great, great work that is going on with the people back at the factory, keeping their heads down. I hope everyone is feeling really proud back at the factory. George did a really good job today, so we delivered good points on a whole. We’ve just got to try to keep this up. For us to be quicker than the Ferraris and the Astons today was really mega," the Mercedes driver added.
Behind Perez, Ferrari's Sainz came home in 5th, while the two Aston Martins then lined up with Lance Stroll taking 6th and Alonso finishing 7th. Alpine's Esteban Ocon was 8th ahead of Zhou Guanyu of Alfa Romeo and Pierre Gasly of Alpine.
With this double podium finish, Mercedes have also leapfrogged Alpine in the race for the constructors and now stand in second with 152 points behind Red Bull, who have 287 to their name. In the drivers' standings, Verstappen is 53 points clear of second-placed Perez, who has 117 points to his name.
