Max Verstappen of Red Bull Sunday won the Spanish Grand Prix from pole position at Barcelona’s Circuit de Catalunya stretching his Formula One lead to 53 points. The two-time defending champion was never challenged as he breezed to his fifth win of the year.
Lewis Hamilton, seven-times world champion, was second for Mercedes. He was 24.09 seconds behind Verstappen. His team mate George Russell completed the podium on third position with 15 points.
Red Bull’s Sergio Perez, Verstappen’s closest rival in a season that looks sure to crown the dominant Dutch 25-year-old for a third time, finished fourth after fighting back from 11th at the start.
It was fifth victory of Verstappen this season, third in a row, third in Spain and the double world champion’s 40th in Formula One.
“It’s a big pleasure to drive with a car like this. I think it showed again today,” said Verstappen, who fended off Ferrari’s home hero Carlos Sainz at the start in the only challenge of an otherwise straightforward afternoon. “Hopefully we can keep it up throughout the year,”he added.
“I had the harder compound so I knew the start would be a bit tricky. Going around the outside at Turn One is always quite difficult but luckily nothing happened.”
Verstappen warned against complacency.
“We just have to focus on ourselves and try to keep on improving our car,” he said. “Of course right now it all looks great, but you can’t stand still in this world.”
His dominant race performance came after he secured pole position with intimidating ease on Saturday. Verstappen set an untouchable top lap time and then watched the rest of the pack scramble for the other spots on the grid from his garage.
Verstappen had said before practice for the Barcelona race that while the Red Bull cars were fast and reliable enough to win every single race, he figured that “We will always have tracks where it doesn’t work out exactly, bad luck in qualifying, mistakes, whatever.”
His 40th career win, including his third in Barcelona, leaves Verstappen one win behind the late Ayrton Senna’s total of 41. He also seems well on course to matching Senna’s three world titles. Verstappen set a Red Bull record with 39 wins last weekend at Monaco, breaking Sebastian Vettel’s record of 38.
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Updated: 05 Jun 2023, 02:34 AM IST