Max Verstappen delighted with Qatar GP victory as he praises team ...
Max Verstappen was delighted with his and Red Bull's efforts after he drove a masterful race around the Lusail International Circuit to win his first Grand Prix in dry conditions since June, avoiding the mayhem that unfolded around him to come out on top.
After securing his fourth world title last time out in Las Vegas, the Dutchman started the weekend with an apparent drop in performance as he struggled in the Qatar Sprint, settling for a single point by crossing the line in P8.
READ MORE: Verstappen surges to victory ahead of Leclerc and Piastri in action-packed Qatar Grand Prix amid three Safety Cars
However, Red Bull were able to make tweaks to his RB20 ahead of qualifying which made a phenomenal difference – Verstappen narrowly claimed pole position ahead of George Russell, with an advantage of just 0.055s.
His weekend took yet another turn when he was handed a one-place grid penalty for driving unnecessarily slowly, leaving him to start the race from P2 while the Mercedes was promoted.
It was a hard-fought victory for Verstappen ahead of Charles Leclerc and Oscar Piastri
That was not enough to deter Verstappen, who quickly took back the race lead off the line and defended it until the chequered flag, albeit with a few close moments with the McLaren of Lando Norris.
“It was a very good race,” the 27-year-old said. “Of course already yesterday in qualifying the car was a lot better. Today, that first stint was very, very fast.
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“Lando and I were just within 1.8s of each other the whole time, pushing each other and honestly it was a lot of fun out there. This track has a lot of grip and this year the tyres were really holding on so that was honestly a lot of fun to be really pushing the tyre. We went really long on that first stint.
“After that of course there were a few Safety Car moments that you had to take care, but very happy. It’s been a while in the dry to be this competitive and very proud of everyone within the team to turn it around within a day. They definitely also deserve this victory.”
After their close battle, Norris was knocked down the order with a stop/go penalty
The Safety Car made an unexpected three appearances during the race for a number of incidents, leaving Verstappen to restart the race each time. The Red Bull man is usually renowned for his ability to control the restart perfectly, which he did on two occasions in Qatar, but his second attempt saw him come under immense pressure from Norris.
He ultimately held onto the lead as the Briton was pushed wide, and explained after the race exactly what went wrong to leave him battling to protect top spot.
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He said: “On the hard tyres there was very little grip. You’ve just come out of the box so they’re already cold, and then immediately of course we had the Safety Car. Behind the Safety Car you can’t warm them up, and then I tried something different out of the last corner where I had no rear grip basically, so I just struggled for traction out of the corner.
“It got a bit spicy into Turn 1 but I think that’s great to see. After that, we drove it to the end with good pace so very happy to win here.”
