Red Bull Motorsports
F1
F1 to 10: What really happened at the Belgian Grand Prix
Max Verstappen's run rolled on at his second home race at Spa, the reigning world champion ensuring Oracle Red Bull Racing created history as the first team to win the opening 12 races of a season.
Part of this story
1. Belgium in exactly 74 words*
*2023 is the 74th season of the F1 world championship
2. The Belgian GP in six pics
The Red Bull duo took their fifth 1-2 result this season
© Getty Images/Red Bull Content Pool
That's 10 wins from 12 races for Verstappen so far in 2023
© Getty Images/Red Bull Content Pool
Pérez made an early breakaway after passing Leclerc
© Getty Images/Red Bull Content Pool
Verstappen passed Piastri and then bolted to win Saturday's Sprint
© Getty Images/Red Bull Content Pool
3. Max's perfect 10
Once Verstappen got in front, there was no stopping him
© Getty Images/Red Bull Content Pool
Verstappen's eighth straight win – Sebastian Vettel holds the record for the most consecutive victories, when the German great took the final nine races of the 2013 season for Red Bull – wasn't as straightforward as Hungary seven days earlier, at least for the first half of the race.
Starting sixth after qualifying fastest but being demoted five grid places for a gearbox change, the Dutchman negotiated what is always a tricky first turn at Spa, the tightening hairpin a magnet for first-lap accidents. As Oscar Piastri (McLaren) was hit by Carlos Sainz (Ferrari) ahead of him, Verstappen tiptoed through to fourth place but was initially stuck behind Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes) for the first five laps as Pérez bolted clear in the lead.
When he cleared the Mercedes and Ferrari by lap nine, Pérez held a 2.9-second advantage, but Verstappen flew after making his first pit stop on lap 14, taking a lead he wouldn’t relinquish on lap 17 and surviving a lurid sideways moment at the high-speed Eau Rouge corner soon after as a shower of rain made the circuit treacherous on slick tyres.
From there, a win was a formality, and he crossed the line 22.305s ahead of his team-mate for a third successive win in the country of his birth, and his 10th victory of a championship he now leads by 125 points heading into the mid-season break.
On Saturday, Verstappen won the 11-lap Sprint race too, heading a surprise podium that featured McLaren's Piastri and Alpine's Pierre Gasly.
For Pérez, finishing more than 20s adrift of his team-mate in the sister car wouldn’t be cause for celebration, but second place and 18 world championship point was his best result since finishing in the same spot back in Miami, seven races ago.
The Mexican's second podium of the year from second on the grid was a repeat of his starting and finishing positions at Spa 12 months ago, and his margin over the third-placed driver in the championship (Fernando Alonso of Aston Martin) increased to 40 points as Oracle Red Bull Racing looks to take a 1-2 at the end of the season for the first time in the team's history.
4. Tsunoda snaps the skid
Tsunoda took a much-needed point for AlphaTauri with 10th
© Getty Images/Red Bull Content Pool
Scuderia AlphaTauri scored points for the first time since the Azerbaijan Grand Prix in round four – a span of eight races – when Yuki Tsunoda secured a point after a feisty drive by the Japanese was rewarded with a third 10th-place result of the season.
Tsunoda set up his weekend by qualifying in an impressive 11th place, and was his signature swashbuckling self in the early stages of the race, running in seventh place on Lap 3 and narrowly missing out on hunting down Aston Martin's Lance Stroll for ninth place as the 44-lap distance counted down.
5. The number you need to know
9: Verstappen's win from sixth on the grid means the reigning world champion has won his 45 Grands Prix from nine different grid positions, drawing level with Fernando Alonso for the most different starting spots to secure victories in the sport's history.
More F1 to watch and read
6. The word from the paddock
I know that we had a great car. It was just about surviving Turn 1. I could see it was all getting really tight. It worked out, and from there onwards … I could do my own pace. Again, really enjoyable
7. The stats that matter
Drivers' championship top 5
Position
Driver
Team
Points
Gap
1
Max Verstappen
Oracle Red Bull Racing
314
-
2
Sergio Pérez
Oracle Red Bull Racing
189
-125
3
Fernando Alonso
Aston Martin
149
-165
4
Lewis Hamilton
Mercedes
148
-166
5
Charles Leclerc
Ferrari
99
-215
Constructors' championship top 5
Position
Team
Points
Gap
1
Oracle Red Bull Racing
503
-
2
Mercedes
247
-256
3
Aston Martin
196
-307
4
Ferrari
191
-312
5
McLaren
103
-400
8. Away from the track
Three F1 drivers. One simulator. Oh, and a blindfold to make things really challenging…
Watch what happens when we let Max loose behind the wheel of a racing sim to lap Silverstone with his eyes covered, trusting Checo and the 'Honey Badger' to tell him which way to go. It's fun more than fast, amusing more than accurate. Check out the video below.
9. Where to next, and what do I need to know?
Round 13 (Netherlands), August 25-27
Circuit name/location: Circuit Zandvoort, Zandvoort
Length/laps: 4.259km, 72 laps
Grands Prix held/debut: 32, 1952
Most successful driver: Jim Clark (four wins)
Most successful team: Ferrari (eight wins)
2022 podium: 1st: Max Verstappen (Red Bull Racing), 2nd: George Russell (Mercedes), 3rd: Charles Leclerc (Ferrari)
10. Inside the wide world of Red Bull Motorsports
On the podium at the Sachsenring
© Gold & Goose/Red Bull Content Pool
Driven, relentless and ambitious – Jorge Martín is all of that, and a lot more. The Spanish rider came to MotoGP in 2021 with plenty of hype after he'd won the Moto3 title in 2018 and taken a pair of victories in two Moto2 seasons, and took no time at all to deliver, qualifying on pole in his second MotoGP race in Qatar, and winning on just his sixth start in the premier class at the Red Bull Ring.
Join us for a race weekend riding shotgun with the Pramac Ducati rider in Germany, where he reflects on his journey to the top flight and discusses why family means everything … oh, and as he takes home a pair of trophies after winning both the Sprint race and Grand Prix proper at the Sachsenring.
Part of this story
