Five talking points from an intense Dutch GP

Red Bull calls it right

Like most on the grid, pole position starter Verstappen started on Pirelli’s red-walled soft tyres for what was planned as a two-stop race. But Hamilton and George Russell, starting fourth and sixth respectively, were on the yellow-walled mediums as Mercedes chose an alternative one-stopper in an effort to beat Red Bull and the Ferraris. It was a decent shout, and did at least give the Red Bull pitwall a headache they could have done without.

Once the Mercedes duo finished their longer first stints and had pitted for the hard tyre, Hamilton was left with a deficit of just under 20 seconds. That was enough to ensure that when Verstappen took his second stop he’d rejoin behind the lead Mercedes. The home hero was on the medium tyre, but still struggled to stretch the gap to a position of safety – meaning at this stage the race was in the balance. Although was it really? Verstappen on fresher tyres for the final stint versus Hamilton on aging white-walled rubber wouldn’t have been much of a fair fight on the notoriously tricky and intense circuit in the sand dunes.

Then Yuki Tsunoda suffered his odd troubles in the AlphaTauri, stopping to report a tyre was not fitted after a pit visit, only to be told otherwise by his team. He returned to the pits, the team tightened his loosened belts, sent him on his way and then ordered him to stop again with a terminal problem. That triggered the Virtual Safety Car and a flurry of stops, Verstappen taking on hards, Hamilton and Russell new mediums. Max kept his lead, but now Hamilton went to work, eating into the gap and reducing it from 15 to 10 seconds – until Valtteri Bottas lost his Alfa Romeo’s engine and parked at the end of the pit straight. A full safety car was required this time.

Now there was chaos – and Verstappen gave up his lead for a new set of softs. Had Red Bull got it wrong? As it turns out, not at all. Mercedes split its strategy, keeping Hamilton out on his mediums in the hope he could defend his lead and win the race, with Russell – anxious about the lost heat in his own mediums – making the call himself for a switch to softs.

At the restart, Verstappen was straight on to Hamilton who struggled to ‘turn on’ his tyres and the Red Bull was ahead long before Turn One. Game over. The Red Bull pitwall had kept its cool and overcome the difficulties thrown at them to give Verstappen just what he needed when he needed it the most. This was a proper team victory.

Hamilton’s apology for radio outburst

The frustration was understandable. From a position where he felt encouraged to at least have a sniff of victory, Hamilton had suddenly found himself a sitting duck – not only for Verstappen, but also for Russell and Leclerc. First quickly became fourth on his relatively useless mediums, and he let loose an x-rated blast to his team on the radio.

Once he’d had time to cool down, Hamilton apologised for his words uttered in the heat of the moment and looked instead to the positives. Yes, this one had slipped away, but overall, Mercedes had found a way to at least put some pressure on Red Bull at Zandvoort. We’re hardly back into the nip-and-tuck days of 2021 when the teams were so equally matched, but here there were at least genuine signs of progress. On Verstappen’s current form, Hamilton will still be hard-pushed to win a race this year – but hope springs eternal.

Russell close to embarrassing Hamilton collision

On the other side of the garage, Russell had reason to be delighted with his day’s work, having risen from sixth on the grid to second and having made the right call on the change to softs as the field streamed into the pitlane under the safety car. The young Englishman isn’t afraid to take control of his own destiny. But at the same time, there was also an element of relief that he hadn’t scored a double own goal for his team.

As Russell drafted up to Hamilton to demote the seven-time champion he almost mis-timed the pass and came close to running into the back of the other Silver Arrow. The moment of “confusion” as he described it turned out to be nothing more than a near-miss – but Mercedes hearts were in mouths for a split second.

More misery for Ferrari

Leclerc had missed out on pole position by a scant 0.021sec, but yet again on Sunday he and his Ferrari team were outplayed – and not only by Red Bull. Mercedes’ one-stop strategy left the red cars out of contention for the win and Leclerc only gained back a podium third because of Hamilton’s tyre misfortune in the closing laps.

As for Carlos Sainz, he and Hamilton had survived a brush at Turn 1 after the start, the Spaniard running third. But a disastrous pitstop pushed him out of the serious running. The call to stop had come too late, leaving the mechanics scrabbling to ready his left-rear tyre. A miserable afternoon was completed by trouble under the safety car. First, Sainz appeared to pass Esteban Ocon on the approach to Turn One as the yellow flags flew for Bottas’s stricken Alfa. Then his team released him from a pitstop into the path of Fernando Alonso, who was forced to brake sharply. That earned Carlos a five-second penalty, meaning fifth on the road became a disconsolate eighth-place finish. Calamitous stuff from the reds yet again.

McLaren left blue as Alpine shines

Sergio Perez picked up fifth for Red Bull having run over Ferrari’s errant spare wheel-change gun during Sainz’s awful first stop. This was hardly a vintage performance from the Mexican, but as usual he put points on the board for his team. Meanwhile, Alonso was delighted by his Alpine team’s strategy that lifted him from a disappointing 13^th on the grid – one place behind his team-mate Ocon – to sixth by the chequered flag. He’d raced beautifully as usual to maximise what he had under him.

Alonso beat Lando Norris to the position, despite the McLaren putting up a stout defence at one stage on the exit of Turn One. And with Ocon adding more points for Alpine in ninth the net gain for the blue team means it is now 24 points ahead of McLaren in their duel for fourth in the constructors’ standings. The French blues would have taken that before the race after a poor Saturday qualifying. Just as well the points are scored on Sunday, when Alonso is always at his best. They’ll miss him next year.

Images courtesy of Motorsport Images.