Just one week after returning from the summer break in Belgium, the F1 show was back in action for the second race in a back-to-back-to-back string of races. The sea of Dutch fans at the FORMULA 1 HEINEKEN DUTCH GRAND PRIX 2022 were all eager to see Max Verstappen win at home, in what would be a race of pit strategy.
Home favourite, Max Verstappen, got away well from pole position on the grid. He immediately moved over to the inside to cover of Charles Leclerc before the first corner. Verstappen started to pull out a gap in the lead, but Leclerc was trying to hold on to the championship leader.
Further back, Lewis Hamilton was a little loose on the inside of the first corner, just tapping the side pod of Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari with his front tyre. Neither driver suffered any noticeable damage.
On the second lap, Kevin Magnussen nearly provided some early drama. He suffered a snap of oversteer on the exit of turn two, sending him wide over the gravel and into the barrier on the inside of the third corner. He managed to keep the car going without losing a lot of time and didn’t really suffer any damage.
Since the circuit is not great for overtaking, the race for the lead quickly became a tyre strategy battle. That said, drivers like Fernando Alonso did provide some on-track action early in the race.
On lap 12, some of the drivers who started the race on the soft tyres near the rear of the field pitted for medium tyres. This was earlier in the race than the originally predicted pit stop window.
Carlos Sainz was the first of the leaders to pit for new tyres on lap 15, followed directly behind by Sergio Perez. There was disaster at the Ferrari pit box. The call to pit was made too late in the lap and the Ferrari mechanics were not ready, which cost them a lot of time. Perez came in, pitted and left before Sainz was done his pit stop. Perez ran over the rear wheel gun of Ferrari, which caught the attention of the stewards for investigation later.
Shortly after, Leclerc and Verstappen also pitted for tyres. On lap 30, Mercedes called Lewis Hamilton into the pit lane to put on the hard tyres for the one-stop strategy. Russell did the same a couple of laps later.
Hamilton rejoined the race behind Sergio Perez, but quickly showed the strong pace of the hard compound tyres. He tried overtaking Perez in the first corner with some help from the DRS, but Perez locked up on the inside of the first corner and Hamilton had to back out of the move to avoid being forced into the gravel.
The following lap, Hamilton got by Perez easily into the first corner, but got caught behind Sebastian Vettel as the Aston Martin driver exited the pit lane. Vettel didn’t get out of the way and held up the Mercedes. Perez had a brief look up the inside of turn three, but didn’t try it. Perez pitted a few laps later for the hard tyres.
With his fresher tyres, Hamilton was able to get within Verstappen’s pit window, meaning Verstappen would come out behind both Mercedes drivers.
After making a pit stop, Yuki Tsunoda pulled over to the side of the track at the fast turn five sector with a suspected loose tyre. After sitting for a little while, the team told him there was nothing wrong and he crawled back into the pit lane. The team changed the tyres and were messing with his seatbelts for a while. He rejoined the race and again parked up in the same corner again. This time it brought out the virtual safety car.
This allowed Verstappen to make a cheap pit stop for hard compound tyres without losing the lead of the race. Both Mercedes drivers also took the opportunity to ditch the one-stop strategy and change to medium tyres.
Ten laps later, the engine in Valtteri Bottas’ car gave up on the main straight and his car cruised to a stop at the end of the straight. Carlos Sainz was overtaking Esteban Ocon on the straight just as the double waved yellow flags came out. The safety car was deployed to allow safety crews to remove the stranded Alfa Romeo from the track.
Verstappen and Leclerc both used this chance to change to the soft tyres and Perez changed to the medium tyres. The following lap, the safety car went through the pit lane, which prompted George Russell to pit for soft compound tyres.
Sainz also pitted under the safety car, but he was later penalized for an unsafe release when he cut off Ocon. Ocon had to slam on the brakes to avoid a collision.
Not having pitted for tyres under the safety car, Hamilton was a sitting duck at the restart and lost the lead Verstappen well before the first corner. A frustrated Hamilton dropped down the field in the closing laps of the race, quickly dropping out of the podium positions.
But this didn’t upset the Dutch fans, who were ecstatic to see their home driver and the current World Drivers’ Championship leader take victory once again in front of his home crowd. Russell stood alongside him with Charles Leclerc, who is now 109 points behind Verstappen in the championship battle.
The teams and drivers will need to wait another week before getting a rest, as it’s another back-to-back weekend. Next up is the Italian Grand Prix in Monza on the weekend of September 11.
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| Race Results | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | M. Verstappen | 26 | |
| 2 | G. Russell | 18 | |
| 3 | C. Leclerc | 15 | |
| 4 | L. Hamilton | 12 | |
| 5 | S. Perez | 10 | |
| 6 | F. Alonso | 8 | |
| 7 | L. Norris | 6 | |
| 8 | C. Sainz | 4 | |
| 9 | E. Ocon | 2 | |
| 10 | L. Stroll | 1 | |
| 11 | P. Gasly | ||
| 12 | A. Albon | ||
| 13 | M. Schumacher | ||
| 14 | S. Vettel | ||
| 15 | K. Magnussen | ||
| 16 | G. Zhou | ||
| 17 | D. Ricciardo | ||
| 18 | N. Latifi | ||
| DNF | V. Bottas | ||
| DNF | Y. Tsunoda | ||
