Kimi goes back to back

At the Madring Kimi Antonelli made it two wins in a row, claiming his first back-to-back victories since winning in Canada in May and Monaco in June. The Italian driver, having made a near-perfect start to the season, had slowly dropped off the pace in the post-Monaco period, winning only one of his previous six starts before Monza. Now the Mercedes driver has seemingly found his winning touch again.

Antonelli, qualifying in second, managed to capitalise on some good fortune after a torrid start on the first lap. The Italian exchanged places on multiple occasions with Lando Norris and Max Verstappen after gaining an advantage by going off track. The Italian had to relinquish his place twice, whilst Verstappen himself gained an advantage over Lewis Hamilton, eventually following team orders to drop down to fourth.

The championship leader sat in second behind Norris until lap 14 before pitting on a Virtual Safety Car caused by Lance Stroll’s retirement. After the VSC ended, Antonelli found himself back in second but behind Charles Leclerc as Norris was unable to capitalise on the incident. The Ferrari strategists opted to keep Leclerc out, hoping for a full safety car later in the race, which never came.

Ferrari would relinquish Leclerc’s position eventually, pitting Leclerc on lap 49 for his mandatory change of tyre compound, allowing Antonelli into the lead. The Italian would go on to put a small but meaningful gap between himself, Verstappen and Norris. He would take the win and extend his lead over team-mate George Russell to 81 points in the Drivers’ Championship.

Lando’s misfortune eliminates previous promise

Norris and McLaren’s season is quickly turning into an up and down rollercoaster of emotions. The British driver was a surprise pole winner in Madrid and took full advantage of it come the start of the race, extending his lead over second place to just under six seconds. On a new street circuit where, unfortunately, overtaking appeared to be almost as difficult as at Monaco, Norris looked almost unassailable from there.

But at the VSC on lap 14, Norris would fall victim to some extremely bad luck, or bad timing, missing the pits by five seconds after the VSC ended. He would go on to pit the following lap as the drivers following him capitalised. Norris’ misfortune was only compounded by a seven-second pit stop, which left him rejoining the race down in sixth.

The World Drivers’ Champion would go on to take home a podium place, finishing third behind Red Bull’s Verstappen as the two fought for second place in the final laps.

The result leaves Norris and McLaren wondering what could have been. Their race pace looked to be more than enough to win. This pace was a reminder of what the Papayas are capable of following their recent car upgrades – even if there hadn’t been much sign of it before qualifying. In post-race interviews, Norris felt hard done by, commenting on the VSC and stating that the rule “shouldn’t define a race.” The Brit remains fourth in the Drivers’ Championship standings leading into Baku.

Brake failure sentences Hamilton to early retirement

Lewis Hamilton’s first race at the Madring was one to forget, the Ferrari driver exiting the Spanish Grand Prix after only seven laps. There was definitely promise which filled the air for many drivers leading into the Madrid street race, as much remained unknown about what could possibly occur. Hamilton himself qualified fourth and looked to score valuable points to keep himself within the Drivers’ Championship title fight.

His race started well enough, overtaking Max Verstappen and looking to keep himself alongside both Norris and Antonelli. But as turn one came, Hamilton took the inner kerb poorly, allowing Verstappen to push once again alongside him. The Dutch driver then entered turn two, exiting the track, overtaking Hamilton and finding himself alongside the top two. Without relinquishing the place, Verstappen would go on to overtake Antonelli and start to push Norris for third.

The incident was quickly reported to the stewards, with Verstappen defending his position: “If I didn’t move, he just shunted into me. I would’ve been ahead.” The stewards disagreed; Verstappen had to relinquish his position to both Antonelli and Hamilton. But no sooner had Hamilton moved up to third place, he was reporting to his engineers that he thought he was ‘having a brake failure’.

Verstappen would take back the place he gave up the next lap, as Hamilton slowly dropped down the order before eventually retiring the brakeless Ferrari.

Formula 1 returns to racing on September 26 for another street race at the Baku City Circuit for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.