Verstappen dominates at rainy & wet Imola for win; Hamilton salvages P2 with remarkable recovery drive after uncharacteristic error; Norris an impressive P3 for McLaren; Bottas crashes out, error-ridden Perez fails to score

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen dominated in tricky wet weather conditions on Sunday at Imola to take victory in the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, his first win of what looks to be a very promising season for both the Dutchman and his team. While cars all around him slipped and slid off on a track that started wet after pre-race rain and never fully dried, Verstappen passed pole-sitter Lewis Hamilton for the lead on Lap 1, kept his ride on the black stuff and avoided the serious trouble that bedeviled so many of contenders throughout the day and flew away to what was eventually a fairly easy victory. Meanwhile Hamilton, his certain archrival for the 2021 championship, made an uncharacteristic unforced error when he was closing up on Verstappen nearly midway thorough the race. Carving his way through back-markers on Lap 31 of this 64-lap contest, Hamilton took it in too deep entering Tosa just three laps after pitting for a set of Medium Pirellis, his first slick tires of the day. Hamilton slid off a damp asphalt and through the gravel, nosing into a barrier. For a while it seemed he might be stuck, as it took the English seven-time champ forever to find reverse. But he finally managed to extricate himself ever so gingerly and headed towards the pits, albeit while losing a lap after such a lengthy delay. Fortunately for Hamilton, though not at all for the team, his Mercedes teammate Valtteri Bottas, who was already having a dismal day mired back in P8, was speared into by Williams’ (and Mercedes development driver) George Russell in a vicious shunt at high speed that sent both cars crashing out with massive damage. While both Bottas and Russell were thankfully OK physically, if none too happy with each other, the massive debris field forced a prolonged Red Flag period on Lap 34.

Pics courtesy GrandPrix247.com

But the disaster for Bottas perversely redounded to Hamilton’s benefit. Not only were the Mercedes mechanics able to change his front wing without losing any time in the pits where all cars still running were now stationary but he also got back on the lead lap at the end of the Red Flag delay, when he and the other lapped cars were allowed to drive around the circuit to get to the tail end of what was now a rolling restart. So while Hamilton had still been shuffled back to P9, he could now begin making passes for position with the resumption of the race, something he did with aplomb in an effort to make amends for his rare gaffe. While Verstappen ran away from the field easily and was now untouchable, Hamilton gradually worked his way up to P5 by Lap 42 and then dispatched the two Ferraris of Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc for P4 and P3 on Laps 50 and 55 respectively. On a day where he looked to have possibly thrown a strong result away after starting from pole, the Englishman’s damage limitation drive came about as good as possible when he executed a masterful pass on the McLaren of Lando Norris to claim P2 on with only four laps remaining. And in so doing, Hamilton also managed to set the race’s fastest lap, thereby claiming the bonus point so that even when Vertsappen won the race by over 20 seconds, Hamilton still retained his Drivers’ Championship lead by a single slim point with his gutsy P2 finish and that opportunistic fastest lap bonus. That said, both Hamilton and Mercedes know they have a real battle on their hands with the Red Bulls this year and that both driver and team have got to improve their performance and consistency if they are going to hold off young Max’s determined pursuit of his first title in equal or perhaps even superior equipment.

All was not sweet music for Red Bull despite Verstappen’s glorious win, however. With Bottas crashing out, the team missed a golden opportunity to land a hard blow against Mercedes in the Constructors’ battle when second driver Sergio Perez made a mess of his opportunity to do score big points. After being handed a penalty on Lap 12 for inexplicably passing under the first Safety Car, Perez still looked to be fighting for a podium when the race resumed post-Red Flag. But on Lap 38 Perez made another unforced error, albeit under tricky wet-dry conditions. Seemingly sitting pretty in P4 with 26 laps remaining to get closer to his teammate and thwart Hamilton’s progress, Perez spun off the circuit and dropped all the way back to P14. The veteran Mexican, of whom much greater things are expected, could only manage to work his way back up to P11 when the laps ran out, scoring zero points on a day where it seemed certain Red Bull would net a far larger haul. The uncharacteristically ragged and fruitless outing by Checo opened the door to McLaren’s Lando Norris for his second career podium and while he could not hold off Hamilton’s hard charging Merc the talented Englishman did keep both Ferraris behind him to claim P3. It was an impressive drive from the ascendent Norris and along with Daniel Ricciardo’s P6 made for a very satisfying day for the much improved McLaren team.

Ferrari also must have been well pleased with a very solid run from team leader Charles Leclerc for P4 and a good comeback drive from Carlos Sainz after some early race mistakes to take P5. AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly also recovered from a nearly disastrous strategy call by the team to keep him out on full wet tires for far too long sent the Frenchman plummeting down the order. But Gasly hung tough and managed to take P7 when Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll was penalized 5-seconds for track limits abuse after the race. Still, Stroll drove well for his adjusted P8 and the points were important for the team in light of Sebastian Vettel being forced to retire due to an accumulation of mechanical gremlins late in the race. And somehow the rather pokey Alpines of Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso also managed to score points in P9 and P10 respectively by dint of simply surviving the fray and staying out of the gravel traps that led to grief for so many drivers on this wet and unpredictable day in Italy. A day that could well be remembered as the beginning of the end of Mercedes-Hamilton hegemony and the real start of the championship run of Max Verstappen.

Top 10 finishers of the Emilia Romagna GP:

Complete race results available via Formula1.com.

With the season now really rolling, the next race is but two weeks away — the Portuguese Grand Prix at the Autódromo Internacional do Algarve aka Portimao. The Round 3 rematch between  Verstappen and Hamilton in what is looking like a season-long heavyweight fight can’t come soon enough for me. Hope to see you then to find out what’s next in the real inter-team rivalry we’ve been waiting for!