Max Verstappen won the Qatar Grand Prix and reduced his championship deficit to just twelve points, after a strategic error by McLaren left Oscar Piastri second and title leader Lando Norris fourth.
Piastri got the perfect start from the clean side of the grid to enter the first corner comfortably in the lead, but Norris, who started second and from the dirty side of the grid, was swamped by Verstappen from third. Verstappen drove alongside Norris through the second stage of the launch and held on around the outside of the McLaren at Turn 1, robbing the title leader of second place.
The battle for the lead remained static in the opening laps, but a battle between Nico Hulkenberg and Pierre Gasly for ninth place set the race on a different trajectory.
Hülkenberg had tremendous pace and rounded the outside of Gasly at the first corner, but at the exit they converged in the middle of the road, with the right rear of the Sauber cutting off the left front of the Alpine, in what the stewards described as a racing incident.
Gasly limped back to the pit lane for repairs, but Hulkenberg was on the spot and provided a safety car with 50 laps to go. It was the first lap in which a driver could make the first stop of a two-stop strategy without driving more than the mandatory maximum of 25 laps per tire set.
By the time the race resumed on lap 11, only the McLaren drivers had not changed tires.
‘We should have just followed him [Verstappen] inside, no? If we knew the car in front of us would stay out,” Norris wondered, but he was told McLaren was prioritizing flexibility around the timing of the pit stops. That would have guaranteed two double stops for the race, with Norris losing both times in a busy pit lane.
Piastri managed the restart and both McLaren drivers shot away from the field at a blistering pace in an attempt to build a gap across the field, but Piastri’s lead over Verstappen peaked at eight seconds over Verstappen on lap 20 – Norris was roughly equidistant between them – at which point the pace of both brands equalized.
Piastri came in on lap 24 and Norris joined him on the next tour. They rejoined fourth and fifth, still four seconds apart, but 19 seconds behind new leader Verstappen. Both drivers cycled back into the lead when Verstappen and the rest of the field retired on lap 32, but neither could gain any ground on the Dutchman during the stint.
The race seemed lost and on lap 40 Piastri encouraged his team to stop him early to maximize the number of laps he had to try to put pressure on Verstappen. He pitted for new hards on lap 42 and came back just in second, only 17 seconds behind with 14 laps to go.
Piastri’s pace was strong early, but the mission was too big. Verstappen finished as a comfortable 8s winner and reduced his title deficit to just 12 points.
“It’s all possible now,” he said of his title hopes. “Super happy to win here. We will stay in the fight until the end. Unbelievable.”
“This was an incredible race for us. We made the right decision as a team to box under the safety car. That was smart. For us I think it was a very strong weekend in a race where it was a bit tough, but we still won the race and that was the most important thing.”
Piastri was bitterly disappointed to leave his strongest weekend in months without a win – and, worse, dropped to third in the championship and still 16 points behind title leader Norris.
“Obviously we didn’t do a good job tonight,” he said. “I think in retrospect it’s pretty clear what we would have done [at the safety car]but I’m sure we’ll discuss it as a team.
“I rode the best race I could, as fast as I could. There was nothing left. I did my best, but unfortunately that wasn’t allowed to happen tonight. It’s obviously a bit hard to swallow at the moment.”
Norris was unable to complete the podium as the Englishman’s relative lack of speed compared to teammate Piastri cost him significantly at the second pit stop.
The title leader retired on lap 44 and was back in fifth, behind Carlos Sainz’s Williams and Kimi Antonelli’s Mercedes. Despite the McLaren being the faster car, Antonelli’s speed on the straight seemed to hold off the title leader until the Italian rookie made a mistake at Turn 10, running wide and opening the door for an easy pass with one lap to go.
But Antonelli’s defense was enough for Sainz, who was able to build enough of a cushion in third place to stay ahead of Norris all the way to the checkered flag, giving him and the team their second podium of the season.
“I’m so happy and so proud of the whole team, of what we did today,” he said. “We started this weekend thinking it would be the toughest weekend of the year and we came out with a podium.
“I was super fast – much faster than expected – we got the strategy, tire management, start, defense and management right, and that gave us an unexpected podium. I couldn’t be more proud.”
Norris headed Antonelli and Mercedes teammate George Russell into sixth place. Fernando Alonso was ahead of Russell and Racing Bulls driver Isack Hadjar before a late spin cost him two places, but Hadjar’s late retirement with a puncture dropped him back to seventh.
Charles Leclerc finished eighth to secure Ferrari’s only four points for the weekend, ahead of Liam Lawson and Yuki Tsunoda.
Alex Albon finished eleventh, ahead of Lewis Hamilton, Gabriel Bortoleto, Franco Colapinto, Esteban Ocon – who was penalized for starting too fast – and Pierre Gasly.
Lance Stroll retired late, joining Hadjar, Oliver Bearman – who was punished for an unsafe release – and Hulkenberg on the list of non-finishers.
RESULTS
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