Devastating Norris Smashes the Field To Take Victory in Zandvoort
After a controlled overtake, Lando Norris went on to take a storming near-23-second victory to finally showcase his and McLaren’s true pace! Home hero Max Verstappen had to settle for second place whilst Charles Leclerc rounded out the Podium after a terrific drive!
The Biggest Talking Points
A lot of positions changed on the opening lap, with Lando Norris once again losing the lead into Turn 1 (to Max Verstappen) whilst George Russell overtook Oscar Piastri for P3 and Charles Leclerc dispatched Sergio Perez for P5! The opening stints’ action came from Lewis Hamilton and Carlos Sainz making their way through the slower cars whilst Pierre Gasly was doing a good job to be ahead of the two Aston Martin’s. Despite taking the lead, Max was unable to pull away from Lando as the McLaren driver comfortably cleared the Triple World Champion to take the lead of the Grand Prix!
The first round of pitstops were really triggered by Charles Leclerc, and the undercut managed to get Leclerc ahead of both Russell and Piastri. The Race then really died down after this, with Norris extending his lead over Verstappen every lap whilst Oscar, who was able to clear George, just couldn’t pass Charles. Carlos Sainz was able to pull off a nice move to clear Checo Perez for P6, and that ultimately turned into P5 after Mercedes made a very questionable strategy to put Russell on a 2-stop (spoiler alert, it didn’t work)! Haas did try and pull off an amazingly long 1-stop for Nico Hulkenberg, but he unfortunately fell out of the points late on after being passed by both Gasly and Fernando Alonso!
The Standout Drives in the Race
I’ve given out two 10’s for today’s Dutch Grand Prix and the first one is obviously for Lando Norris! Even though he very much has the fastest car nowadays, Lando still needed to deliver when it counts which is what he did, he also showed great pace to keep pulling further and further away from the cars behind, and he definitely deserved this victory! The other driver I’ve given out maximum points to is Charles Leclerc because I thought Charles drove an incredible Race today, and I’m not sure if many, if at all anyone had Leclerc finishing on the Podium for Ferrari! I also thought Max Verstappen did the best he could to finish second, Pierre Gasly had a great Race to finish P9, and Carlos Sainz did well to recover to P5!
Drivers Who Had a Shocker
I’ve only given out one 1 for today’s Race, and that is unfortunately for Zhou Guanyu! I know Kick Sauber are bad, but Zhou is miles off his teammate which is just frankly not good enough! I also thought Yuki Tsunoda and Kevin Magnussen had disappointing days given where their teammates are, and Lance Stroll also deserves a mention here because he stupidly sped in the pitlane!
Overall Race Results and My Ratings
Lando Norris: 10 (FL)
Max Verstappen: 9
Charles Leclerc: 10
Oscar Piastri: 7
Carlos Sainz: 8
Sergio Perez: 6
George Russell: 5
Lewis Hamilton: 5
Pierre Gasly: 9
Fernando Alonso: 5
Nico Hulkenberg: 7
Daniel Ricciardo: 6
Lance Stroll: 3
Alex Albon: 5
Esteban Ocon: 4
Logan Sargeant: 3
Yuki Tsunoda: 2
Kevin Magnussen: 2
Valtteri Bottas: 3
Zhou Guanyu: 1
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