The HDutch Max Verstappen (Red Bull) won this Sunday the rainy and grotesque Belgian Grand Prix, the twelfth of the Formula 1 World Championship and the shortest in history; that, after several interruptions and postponements, it was played just three laps – instead of the 44 scheduled – behind the safety car, with only half the points being valued.
Instead of 25, Verstappen added twelve and a half points by winning ahead of the English George Russell (Williams, who took nine points) and Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes), seven times world champion, who was third and continues to lead the World Cup, after adding seven and a half points: with 202.5, three points more than the Red Bull Dutchman.
The race, which was scheduled to start at three in the afternoon (10 hours in Argentina), ended up being delayed by three deadlines until The cars began to roll behind the safety car, without it being known yet whether the start would be given from the grid or behind the ‘safety car’. After completing a lap of the longest circuit in the World Cup (7,004 meters) and Given the evidence of the danger due to the conditions of the track and the lack of visibility, a red flag was decreed and all the cars returned to garages.
After several announcements regarding new information and more than three hours after the scheduled time, everyone took to the track to do two laps behind the safety car before decree a new red flag; in order for there to be at least one classification and for the test to score half.
The The possibility of the race being postponed until Monday was logistically unfeasible, because next weekend it will race again, in Holland.
The Australian Daniel Ricciardo (McLaren) was fourth in a race that the Spanish Carlos Sainz (Ferrari) finished tenth and added, for that reason, half a point. The Madrilenian remains sixth in the World Cup, now with 38 and a half points. His compatriot Fernando Alonso (Alpine) finished eleventh and Mexico’s Sergio Pérez (Red Bull), twentieth.
‘Checo’, who had started seventh, crashed on the installation lap and at first it seemed that he would lose the race by damaging the front suspension. With the postponements and interruptions, Red Bull fixed his car and allowed him to leave from the pit lane, only to finish in the position in which he started: 20th.
The German Sebastian Vettel (Aston Martin) and the French Pierre Gasly (Alpha Tauri) were fifth and sixth, in a race that Frenchman Esteban Ocon, Alonso’s teammate in Alpine, finished seventh. Also scored were Charles Leclerc -Sainz’s partner in Ferrari-, who finished eighth; and Canadian Nicholas Latifi (Williams), ninth.
The Next race, the Dutch Grand Prix, will be held next weekend in Zandvoort.
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