Verstappen and Leclerc have to report to the stewards at 5:50 PM.
Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff remains vague towards Viaplay: “I don’t know what happened. Max would have heard that he had to let George pass. But if it was road rage, that’s not good.”
Helmut Marko responds to Viaplay: ‘The only new tire we had left was the hard tire. But it performed worse than we expected. The only soft tires we had left were 17 laps old, so that wouldn’t have worked either. The three-stop could have worked.’
About the incident with Russell: ‘He thought it was unfair that he had to let Russell pass’.
The much-discussed moment between Verstappen and Russell. The Dutchman still has to explain what happened here himself. The race management found it worth a ten-second time penalty in any case.
The moment the stewards are still going to look at. Leclerc and Verstappen go side by side and touch each other. But the chance of penalties still being handed out is not that great.
Verstappen gets out of his car, looking for some literal and figurative cooling.
‘Ooohh’ sounds in the cooldown room when the top three get to see the collision between Verstappen and Russell.
The frustrations with Verstappen seem to have arisen at the restart, apart from his hard tires. First there was some contact with Leclerc, which the stewards are still looking at. Then Russell also touched him lightly in the first corner, after which he went off the track and quickly got back on it. Red Bull ultimately thought he should let the Mercedes driver go for that, but Verstappen didn’t think so.
Leclerc: “It was a battle for the slipstream to the cars in front of us. I wanted to push him a little to the left, there was unfortunately some contact. But not much.”
The stewards are also going to look at the contact between Leclerc and Verstappen on the straight after the restart.
That was a hectic final phase in which a frustrated Verstappen overstepped the mark. It ultimately does not cost Russell a position, but it is, to say the least, food for thought.
VERSTAPPEN GETS A TEN-SECOND TIME PENALTY AND THUS BECOMES TENTH.
A great sixth place for Hülkenberg. Fernando Alonso also takes another point with tenth place for his own audience.
FINISH: Piastri wins in Spain, ahead of Norris and Leclerc. Verstappen finishes fifth behind Russell.
Last lap running: Piastri needs one more lap then he has won. Verstappen remains close to Russell, but seems to have to settle for fifth place. The race management is looking into the incident.
It was a very strange action from Verstappen, it must be said, against Russell. He seemed to let him past, but then drove full into the side.
2 laps to go: Hulkenberg overtakes Hamilton in the meantime and is sixth!
Nor 2 laps to go: Verstappen still lets Russell past.
2 laps to go: Red Bull says that Verstappen must let Russell past. But then the two hit each other! They can go on though.
3 laps to go: Verstappens tires are finally up to temperature and he remains within striking distance of Leclerc. The gap is a second towards third place. Russell is still 0.6 seconds behind.
5 laps to go: Verstappen almost really lost the car at the restart when coming onto the straight. That was a great piece of car control. After that it was elbows between Leclerc, Russell and Verstappen. The race management is investigating the last two.
5 laps to go: Verstappen says that Leclerc hit him on the straight, but is meanwhile under full pressure from Russell. Leclerc is faster and drives away. At the front Norris is within a second of Piastri.
The restart: Verstappen has to let Leclerc go and loses third place. He also briefly goes off the track but stays ahead of Russell.
7 laps to go: Long procedure this to let everyone rejoin who was a lap behind. We have a whole top ten on soft tires, except… Verstappen so on his hard tires.
8 laps to go: The cars that were a lap behind are allowed to overtake. It looks like the safety car will come in the next lap. Mercedes reports that Antonelli has dropped out with an engine problem, oil pressure loss.
9 laps to go: Antonelli’s Mercedes is being towed out of the gravel pit. Verstappen will soon have Leclerc and Russell behind him on relatively new soft tires. That will be interesting.
Verstappen is stunned that he got the hard tires. ‘That was the only option Max’.
Verstappen has gone to his new set of hard tires. Leclerc comes behind him on softs. The McLarens are also driving on softs.
With 11 laps to go, Antonelli parks his Mercedes in the gravel pit of turn 8. The top three dive inside.
12 laps to go: It was nice for a while how Red Bull strategically brought Verstappen back near the McLarens, but the resistance now seems broken. Norris is easily driving away again, Piastri is doing the same at the front. Verstappen doesn’t have to look back.
14 laps to go: Chaos in front of Norris’ nose, with a fierce duel between Lawson and Bearman. Norris loses some time, but Verstappen can’t quite connect enough. “Fucking Idiots”, is the comment from the Red Bull.
16 laps to go: To really attack Norris immediately, everything had to go well for Verstappen. That didn’t happen. Tsunoda drove a bit in the way and Sainz drove in front of Norris exactly in the right place to ward off that one attack. Norris is now opening up a small gap again. Verstappen continues to complain about the handling of his car.
16 laps to go: Piastri stops. Norris meanwhile has the advantage of Sainz in front of him who gives him DRS. That protects him against an attack from Verstappen.
17 laps to go: Verstappen still quickly connects with Norris and is in the wake of the McLaren.
18 laps to go: McLaren naturally responds immediately and brings Norris in. He also goes to soft. A smooth stop. The gap has become smaller, but Norris is still in front.
18 laps to go: Verstappen tries to close the last bit to Norris with an undercut, helped by his soft tires. He does lose some time in the first corner behind Tsunoda, who immediately jumps aside.
20 laps to go: Piastri drives considerably away from Norris and is now almost 10 seconds ahead of Verstappen again. He himself is still looking at 4.4 seconds to Norris. If Verstappen can fight with the McLarens, it is with Norris. Piastri is heading for victory.
22 laps to go: Verstappen is giving up a bit on Norris again, the gap is increasing to 4.3 seconds.
24 laps to go: The McLarens are also having some trouble with the back markers, which Verstappen of course also has to pass. Russell has meanwhile stopped for soft tires and is driving 9 seconds behind Leclerc in fifth place. His teammate Antonelli is still in between, but he – like Hamilton in fourth place – still has to stop.
25 laps to go: The times continue to roll out of Verstappen’s Red Bull. He has now reduced the gap to Norris to 4.0 seconds. Piastri is still 2.7 seconds ahead of his teammate.
26 laps to go: Leclerc dives in for his second set of mediums. Verstappen is told by GP that ‘McLaren realizes they are being threatened’.
27 laps to go: Norris was faster than Verstappen last lap and still holds a lead of 4.8 seconds over the Dutchman. Piastri is only 2.7 seconds ahead of his teammate.
28 laps to go: Norris and Piastri are stepping up a gear and accelerating, but Verstappen was still the fastest of the three last lap. The Red Bull has come to life quite nicely in this race.
29 laps to go: Verstappen is also making Norris a bit nervous. The gap to the rear McLaren is still 5.2 seconds. Verstappen has been a few tenths faster in recent laps.
31 laps to go: Verstappen passes Leclerc, an important action for the fight for third place. They both still have to stop once and Verstappen now has ‘track position’. The only difference is that Leclerc will then get a set of new mediums and Verstappen will have to do it with softs. But the soft tires are holding out quite well so far.
33 laps to go: Verstappen is complaining again about clutch problems and is joking about it with his engineer GP. Meanwhile, he is driving towards Leclerc. He is still 2.9 seconds ahead of him.
34 laps to go: Lawson is now arguing with Bearman and even drives against the Haas in the first corner. The race management is going to look into it.
36 laps to go: Verstappen comes back in front of Hamilton and thus in fourth place. It is a long way to the finish on this set of mediums. Or will it be a three-stopper for the Limburger? It seems so.
36 laps to go: Verstappen comes in for his second stop and gets the mediums.
38 laps to go: Verstappen is 4 seconds ahead of Piastri. Meanwhile, he continues to complain over the radio. The Red Bull doesn’t want to cooperate.
39 laps to go: Verstappen drives 1.20.6. Piastri, Norris and Leclerc also drive high 1.19’s. Hamilton drives the same while as Verstappen, but keeps Russell at bay for the time being.
41 laps to go: Contact between Albon and Lawson in the first corner. The Williams driver damaged his front wing, leaving the first corner littered with pieces of carbon. No intervention from the race management for the time being.
42 laps to go: Hamilton must mainly look back, where Russell is approaching on newer tires. The Mercedes front man is almost a second faster than his old teammate.
43 laps to go: Verstappen has a lead of 5.6 seconds over Piastri, who will soon catch up with the reigning world champion. Norris is 4.5 seconds behind his teammate. Behind that is Leclerc, five seconds from Norris. The battle for third place will mainly be between Verstappen and Leclerc until further notice, who will soon be able to get a second set of new mediums. Verstappen no longer has that and must go to soft or, more unlikely, hard.
44 laps to go: Piastri also comes in for mediums. Verstappen also passes the WK leader on the track, but does so on much older tires.
45 laps to go: Norris also comes in for mediums. Verstappen passes him on the track and is second again.
45 laps to go: Russell also comes in, causing Leclerc and Hamilton to move up a place again. The Mercedes driver comes back on the track a few seconds behind Hamilton with his only set of mediums.
47 laps to go: Verstappen also easily drives past Russell on his new tires and is back in third place. He is also virtually ahead of Norris now, who still has to stop.
48 laps to go: Verstappen settles with Antonelli and is back in fourth place. Russell still has to stop in front of him.
49 laps to go: Leclerc responds to his teammate’s stop and also comes in.
49 laps to go: Hamilton stops from fourth place and gets his only set of mediums from Ferrari.
50 laps to go: The McLaren drivers are not tempted by Verstappen, who has meanwhile passed Hadjar. Piastri and Norris continue, with a gap of 4.2 seconds between them. The Ferrari drivers also continue. Verstappen is fast now, so virtually he is making up some time.
51 laps to go: Verstsappen has fallen back to eighth place, behind Isack Hadjar.
52 laps to go: Soft tires for Verstappen. Meanwhile, Alonso has taken a lap through the gravel.
53 laps to go: Verstappen immediately looks for the pits.
53 laps to go: There is no stopping Verstappen, who has to let Norris pass when entering the first corner. There was no question of really defending.
54 laps to go: A few drivers have already looked up the pits. We are also already approaching the limit for the soft tire predicted by Pirelli, which would be around lap 12. Gasly, Hülkenberg, Bearman, Tsunoda Albon and Sainz have already stopped. Tsunoda is particularly striking, who started on the mediums. Maybe he is now serving as a guinea pig for Verstappen.
55 laps to go: Norris is on top of Verstappen, who is still holding on for a while. ‘I have no grip’, the Dutchman tells his team.
56 laps to go: Norris has meanwhile come within DRS at Verstappen.
56 laps to go: Ferrari intervenes. Hamilton must let his teammate pass. It doesn’t come from the heart. Leclerc has already lost a few unnecessary seconds, although it is understandable that Hamilton does not immediately make way for his teammate.
57 laps to go: Leclerc attacks again, but Hamilton slams the door shut.
58 laps to go: Norris is told that he can attack Verstappen. ‘The tires are up to temperature’, McLaren tells him. Meanwhile, it cannot be long before Leclerc reports on the radio that he wants to pass Hamilton. He is clearly being held up. Hamilton is almost a second slower than the drivers in front of him.
59 laps to go: Leclerc increases the pressure on Hamilton, who is clearly holding him up. A first attack at the end of start-finish is repulsed. Verstappen keeps Norris at bay for the time being.
61 laps to go: Piastri is driving away a bit from Verstappen, the gap is already 2.5 seconds. Norris is approaching.
62 laps to go: Piastri is breaking away a bit from Verstappen. There is no more DRS, the gap is 1.3 seconds.
64 laps to go: Verstappen remains close to Piastri and is within DRS at the WK leader. Then there is a gap of 1.7 seconds to Norris.
65 laps to go: While Piastri has the lead fairly comfortably, Russell is trying to fight back at Leclerc. There is also a lot of fighting around Alonso, Hadjar and Hülkenberg for ninth and tenth place.
65 laps to go: Leclerc moves up two places at the expense of the Mercedes and is fifth, Hamilton is also past his compatriot.
The start: Verstappen gets away better than Norris and takes over second place. Piastri keeps the lead.
We have tire news: everyone starts as expected on the soft tires, except for Tsunoda who starts from the pits.
The Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya is an enormous tire eater, especially at these temperatures. It is mainly about the front left tire. Just think of the long turning corner 3. the fast corner 7 and the last few corners of this track: that left front tire gets a huge beating there. So it will be managing for the drivers.