Yahoo Autos F1 Belgium Grand Prix Results: Verstappen Maintains Unbeaten Run
Max Verstappen made it eight victories in a row, and 10th overall from 12 races in 2023, to continue his unstoppable march to a third straight Formula 1 world title. Autoweek rounds up the main talking points from the Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps.
Verstappen’s Eighth In A Row
The countries change, the view outside the window changes, but a cursory glance at the timing screens tells an unchanging picture. Max Verstappen continued his crushing dominance of the 2023 Formula 1 season with another imperious display, this time at the Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps, to extend his title advantage to an astonishing 125 points.
It has been an absolute snoozefest at the front of the field this season as not even a five-place grid penalty for an unscheduled gearbox change could halt the Verstappen train. The reigning World Champion made it into the lead on lap 17 of 44, won by 22 seconds, and even had time to have petty arguments with Race Engineer Gianpiero Lambiase over tire usage during the final stint of the grand prix.
Verstappen’s victory was his eighth in a row, leaving him just one shy of Sebastian Vettel’s record of nine, which he could match on home soil in the Netherlands next time out, when Formula 1 returns from its summer recess. In eight of the 11 races so far this season Red Bull has had a margin of at least 20 seconds over the next non-Red Bull car, and in those other three races there were mitigating circumstances whereby the advantage was smaller than it should have been. Verstappen and Red Bull are operating at a relentlessly extraordinary level as man, machine, and team gels in perfect harmony.
Leclerc Puts Ferrari Back On The Podium
Ferrari entered 2023 with ambitions of competing for the title but they were dismantled pretty early on once it realised the extent of its weaknesses and the strengths of Red Bull’s RB19. Charles Leclerc nonetheless gave Ferrari a reason to enter the summer recess on a relative high by claiming third spot at a circuit where he captured his first victory back in 2019.
Leclerc’s pole position was something of a mirage owing to fastest qualifier Verstappen taking a penalty, and his lead lasted only a few metres before Sergio Perez blasted past, but the Ferrari driver kept the rest at bay to take just his and Ferrari’s third podium result of the season.
“Before the first race the target was to do a step better [than 2022], to win the world championship, if you look at the first half of the year we are very far from where we put our expectations,” said Leclerc. “On the other hand, once we understood, we reset, and there was an incredible reaction from the team, they brought some upgrades one-and-a-half months earlier [than planned].
“We still have things to look at as maybe we haven’t optimized the package in some races, such as Budapest, and maybe we did something to optimize it here. It’s good to finish anyway on a positive note on the first half of the season and we will take the summer break to look and analyze and hopefully maximize the package at all races for the second half of the season.”
