Max Verstappen wins the Brazilian Grand Prix

Red Bull driver Max Verstappen triumphed in the Brazilian Grand Prix at Interlagos, braving rainy conditions. The Dutch world champion led the two Alpines of Esteban Ocon, second, and Pierre Gasly. Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc finished fifth, while McLaren’s Lando Norris was sixth.

Incidents and Outages

During the Grand Prix, halfway through the race with 32 laps completed out of 69, the red flag was shown due to the accident of Franco Colapinto, who lost control of his Williams due to the increasing rain. The race was stopped with Ocon in the lead, followed by Verstappen, while Norris was fourth and Leclerc seventh. After a delay at the start of the race, caused by the spin of Lance Stroll in the Aston Martin, the race finally got underway. The Mercedes of George Russell took the lead, followed by the McLaren of Norris. Leclerc managed to gain a position, while Verstappen made a rapid comeback from 17th to 11th.

Qualifying and pole position

In qualifying, Lando Norris took pole position with a time of 1:23.405, ahead of the Mercedes of Russell and Yuki Tsunoda for Racing Bulls. Qualifying took place on Sunday after a delay due to adverse weather conditions at Interlagos, leading to numerous interruptions. Due to the difficult conditions, the start of the Grand Prix was brought forward to 16:30 Italian time instead of 18:00. Several red flags were shown for accidents involving Sainz, Stroll, Alonso and Albon, all of whom were without serious consequences. Verstappen, penalized by the red flag for Stroll’s accident and a penalty for not respecting the Delta Time, started from 17th position. Carlos Sainz will have to come back from 14th position, while Lewis Hamilton was in sixteenth.

“The race was intense and full of twists and turns due to the weather conditions,” Verstappen commented after the victory.