Lando Norris doubles up with a second consecutive win for McLaren. Talking of doubles, our Dutch Grand Prix Result Summary doubles as a detailed race report and something to ignore. With just a hint of cynicism, bias, opinion and colour. The perfect bite sized review for those who couldn’t be bothered watching live in the parts of the planet where it’s night time, or don’t have enough time regardless of time zone.
Dutch Grand Prix Result Race Summary
Didn’t see the race live? Don’t have time to watch the whole race? Here’s where we capture the laps where stuff happened. We write these live as we go, sort of like a minute by minute for the football, but marginally more interesting.
Setting the scene – SPRINT / QUALIFYING
Sprint was a George Russell affair, as he took Sprint Qualifying pole and won the Sprint race. You’d have to start questioning the value of the Sprint Races, as there were just two position changes in the top eight with Charles Leclerc taking Lando Norris’ second place, and Kimi Antonelli taking Oscar Piastri’s fourth place. And it was pretty dull.
Proper qualifying saw Lando Norris continue his recent good form and McLarens with Piastri fastest in Q1 and himself in Q2 and Q3. Piastri ended up 4th which was slightly underwhelming. But better than Ferrari’s 5th and 6th or Verstappen in 7th. Liam Lawson (8th) did well on short notice to drive for main Red Bull after Isack Hadjar injured himself in the summer break, as did Yuki Tsunoda in 12th on even shorter notice.
GRID AFTER Q3 – NOR RUS ANT PIA HAM LEC VER LAW BOR LIN
Setting the scene – RACEDAY
Race day is wet. Not full umbrellas, race ruined by long delays and cowardly officiating, but just wet enough. It should be lots of fun on this track with a wet surface, and brings the less competitive front runners into play. And the midfield too. What kind of tyres will everyone take is the question? With potentially more rain on the way, team will probably go conservative or stick to dry tyres.
By race start the track is almost dry and so all the drivers are on dry weather tyres. But there are some wet patches, the final banked corner for one, so maybe some fun awaits.
Lap 1 – Lando Norris turns pole position into first place through the first corner, Oscar Piastri gets away well in fourth but a slower starting George Russell swerves at him and keeps him behind but not his team mate Antonelli who takes second. Someone pushes Verstappen onto the grass briefly as they approach turn one, but he survives, it was a chain reaction caused by Russell’s move on Piastri. As do all the cars through most of the first lap until…..
HUGE CRASH. Massive crash at the final banked corner at pace…it’s Verstappen!!!! The home town hero is out of the last ever race at the track. What a party pooping moment for the Dutch fans. Replays show the Red Bull spearing left out of the final corner, and with the Red Bull playing dodgems with the walls, looks like all four corners of the car are affected. Verstappen is ok but the race is stopped.
RED FLAG – RACE STOPPED.
Replays during the break show Liam Lawson and Pierre Gasly did well to avoid being involved in Verstappen’s crash, and same for Gabriel Bortoleto who did a nice 360 spin and resumed without breaking his car or anything.
ORDER – NOR ANT RUS LEC PIA HAM LAW LIN GAS COL
Lap 3 – Race Resumes behind the Safety Car, but they will go to a standing start to officially restart the race. In the break McLaren have switched Oscar Piastri to a hard tyre, which may be strategic genius further confirmation of his status as the number two driver.
Not sure how, but a bunch of cars are only leaving pit lane as the bulk of the field is nearly at the grid. To confuse things further, Oliver Bearman has parked on the edge of the circuit halfway around the lap, not even off the track. Surely they can’t restart the race if Bearman can’t restart his car/race. He doesn’t and his car is yanked off the track.
The stragglers have caught up who have been waiting on the grid for a long time, but the drivers don’t seem sure where to line up. With all that happening, the F1 folk in charge decide to have another formation lap.
Lap 5 – Race restarts again from a standing start.
Kimi Antonelli gets away better from second than Lando N orris who keeps trying to squeeze him against the pitwall. Kimi is having nothing of it, and having the inside line into the first corner means he takes the lead from Norris. A few corners later Oscar Piastri nails George Russell is an unbelievable move. That’s to go with his one spot gained from the start. He’s on the hard tyre and doesn’t have to stop again. That might ruin some races behind him including Russell and both Ferraris.
ORDER – ANT NOR PIA RUS LEC HAM LAW GAS HUL COL
Lap 7 – The front two – Antonelli and Norris have cleared out a bit in front, they are almost four seconds ahead of Oscar Piastri who is developing a nice train behind him. His team just advised Norris that potential small amount of rain is coming. Wonder if they told Oscar as well. Either way, a bit more entertainment is always welcome.
Lap 10 – So in case you’re wondering what all the tyre strategies are, here is tyre choice of the cars most likely to win today first, followed by the quirks in the midfield and lower.
ANT – Medium, NOR – Soft, PIA – Hard, RUS – Medium, LEC/HAM – Soft.
Alpines are on Medium, Cadillac – Hard, Albon – Hard.
Lap 11 – Antonelli has seen his lead grow out to more than a second, and it’s four seconds more back to Piastri. Leclerc is threatening to demote George Russell and is on his tail, but just isn’t able to get by given the nature of the track. Russell’s radio offer up a suggestion for Plan A, which may be a good idea, as he is slipping back from Piastri on supposedly better tyres.
Lap 16 – Norris tells his team via radio that his pace is zero and he has nothing left. The gap to Antonelli has extended a little as a result. Talking of zero, little results and gap, Lance Stroll pits for new tyres and rejoins last. Between all the drivers with tyre troubles, Kimi Antonelli has an easy and a fastest lap.
Lap 18 – George Russell pits from fourth and rejoins 9th, dropping behind Nico Hulkenberg. The Mercedes is past in a nice move before the end of the lap.
Lap 19 – Oscar Piastri pits for new tyres, and it’s a longer stop (by today’s standards) and the delay costs the McLaren driver a place to George Russell. You can’t say sabotage, but Piastri is very unlucky. George Russell sets fastest lap to let everyone know he’s still race-ready.
ORDER – ANT NOR LEC HAM LAW RUS PIA ALB ALO SAI
Lap 23 – The top three pit for tyres and the top two maintain their order but Leclerc falls behind George Russell and Oscar Piastri. Lewis Hamilton leads having not stopped yet.
Lap 26 – Lewis Hamilton pits from the lead and takes hard tyres unlike his team mate on mediums. He also drops to 6th place.
Lap 27 – Nice battle brewing for 9th place starting from Carlos Sainq to Yuki Tsunoda in 14th. In between is Hulkenberg, both Alpines and Arvid Lindblad. Fernando Alonso is quietly going about being 8th, ahead of this train.
Lap 29 – Tsunoda pulls a nice move on Pierre Gasly, showing some sharp racing skills for someone who has been “resting” from F1 this season.
Lap 30 – Further ahead Lando Norris is less than a second behind Antonelli in a battle for the lead, and behind them Charles Leclerc is only half a second behind Oscar Piastri.
ORDER – ANT NOR RUS PIA LEC HAM LAW ALO HUL TSU
Lap 34 – Leclerc passes Piastri after a robust but fair argument for that fourth place. Lewis Hamilton makes it two places lost for Piastri in two laps on lap 35.
Lap 38 – The leaders have hit the backmarkers and lapping the slower cars sees the lead between Antonelli and Norris accordion from just under a second to just over two.
Lap 39 – Black and White flag for Oscar Piastri for “Driving Erratically”. It relates to his brief battle with Lewis Hamilton. It certainly wasn’t worse than George Russell almost putting Piastri through the wall on the first start. No time penalty
Lap 41 – Kimi Antonelli pits from the lead handing Lando Norris a chance to storm to the lead with a chance to keep it after he stops again. George Russell also pits and drops to 6th. Lewis Hamilton does the old “faster than team mate ahead of me, so can you please get him out of the way?” over his radio. Charles responds with angry banter. They are battling for third overall and second on track. Ferrari make that decision easier by pitting Leclerc on lap 44 who drops to 6th.
Lap 45 – Oscar Piastri pits and falls behind Liam Lawson who is now 6th. One of those underwhelming weekends again, which are becoming sadly too frequent lately. Piastri makes light work of Lawson and is past within a lap. Meanwhile Lando Norris is trying to build a gap to continue leading after his final tyre stop.
Lap 48 – Norris pits, and it’s a good stop, but not good enough to come out behind Antonelli. He’s a bout four seconds behind, but will have fresher tyres towards the end of the race. On screen graphic says we don’t have to wait that long for a battle.
Lap 51 – Lando Norris is flying, setting fastest lap on his way to closing the gap to Antonelli to half a second. The Mercedes stays in front for now. Lewis Hamilton is still leading and could be trying to go to the end. Much to his disappointment.
Lap 54 – Lando Norris sensationally gets past Kimi Antonelli, around the outside of the first corner as they both closed in on Lewis Hamilton, what a move, and he doubles down on Hamilton half a lap later with a move that was good, but hard to beat that first one. Kimi is past Lewis Hamilton within a lap, but with Norris’ pace he’ll struggle to catch the McLaren.
Lap 55 – Esteban Ocon stops on track, presuming to retire, which brings out a virtual safety car, which allows Lewis Hamilton to pit for new tyres just after blowing up at his team accusing them of using him as a guinea pig. Leclerc and Piastri pit for new tyres too.
VIRTUAL SAFETY CAR CALLED
Lap 57 – Kimi Antonelli pits for new tyres to drop to third behind his team mate Goerge Russell. This worries Lando Norris as he remarks over radio, but it’s too late. The Virtual Safety Car is over. Norris does lead Russell by 7 seconds and another 6 seconds further back to Antonelli.
VIRTUAL SAFETY CAR ENDS
ORDER – NOR RUS ANT HAM LEC PIA LAW HUL ALO GAS
Lap 62 – Ten laps to go and Lando Norris is clearing out from George Russell, who is being caught quickly by Antonelli, but not quick enough for the Italian to catch Norris in the lead despite having newer tyres.
Lap 66 – Kimi Antonelli gets by George Russell for second with some help from the team’s tacticians. Needless to say George Russell isn’t thrilled about it. He has bigger worries, like Lewis Hamilton chasing in fourth place.
Lap 69 – Lewis Hamilton has a big dive at George Russell but misses out on passing the Mercedes for now. It seems inevitable that the Ferrari will get past and Russell will moan about it.
VIRTUAL SAFETY CAR
Lap 70 – Virtual Safety Car called due to debris on track needing to be cleaned up. Looks like the bits of errant car belong to one of the Williams cars, or both, as replays show them running into each other.
VIRTUAL SAFETY CAR ENDS
Lap 71 – Race resume and Lewis Hamitlon is close to Russell but can’t get past. He has one more try into the first corner, the only decent spot for overtaking on this track.
FINAL LAP – Lando Norris is far ahead of the Ferrari v Russell scrap and is almost missed crossing the line, it is a very good win for the McLaren driver. Antonelli doesn’t really close in on Norris in the end but second will do. Russell holds onto the final podium place, which will probably annoy Ferrari and it should. Nice point for Lawson, Hulkenberg and Gasly, and more progress for Alonso and Aston Martin finishing 9th.
FINAL ORDER (Across the line): NOR ANT RUS HAM LEC PIA LAW HUL ALO GAS
Here we go through the field and highlight the very best (Great) of the race, and the plodders, the over-ambitious, the out of luck, and simply hopeless (Grape).
These points get added to our Driver of the Season scores. 5 points for a great nomination, and -5 for the worst or grapest driver in the pack. Then it is +2 /-2 for honourable or dishonourable mentions.
THE GREAT-EST – LANDO NORRIS
Back to back wins from pole position either side of the summer break for the current World Champion, and the form is ominous for the rest of the field, as an unlikely Championship tilt could be brewing. His move on Antonelli was superb and deserved victory.
HONOURABLE MENTIONS
KIMI ANTONELLI – Second place and keeping his closest Championship rivals behind will do for now.
LIAM LAWSON – A solid 7th place on his return to the Red Bull team after replacing an injured HAdjar.
NICO HULKENBERG – Nice quiet drive to 8th place.
FERNANDO ALONSO – More points, more progress for the team. Not a bad effort after being cut in Q1.
YUKI TSUNODA – No points, but a solid weekend filling in for Racing Bulls.
THE GRAPE-EST – M. VERSTAPPEN
If it wasn’t bad enough having the fourth fastest car, he totals it at the end of the first lap in a high speed crash. He’s ok, but his car suffers significant damage and the crash stops the race. Not a great way to sign off the final Dutch GP.
DISHONOURABLE MENTIONS
OSCAR PIASTRI – Second best to Lando Norris all weekend, and a 6th place in the race is underwhelming. His race is not without bad luck, but that is starting to follow him in a Mark Webber-like curse.
HAAS – Double DNF, and overall not great weekend.
WILLIAMS – Bad enough to have poor qualifying and score no points, but then their drivers run into each other late in the race.
Was it a good race, loads of action, a tense ending, a surprise result or DNF, or just a big, fat, snooze-fest?
We rate the big race itself, so we know which races to go back and watch in the off season or one to simply remember the winner for the post season quiz nights.
PRE RACE ACTION (FP, QUAL, SPRINT, OFF TRACK etc) – 2 / 5
Despite having a Sprint Race, it was pretty dull, and the threat of rain disappeared for the F1.
ON TRACK ACTION (RACE) – 6 / 10
Pit stops kept the race interesting to a point. A properly good overtake for the lead helps for action. Some midfield racing. The track is fast and spectacular but overtaking a little bit at a premium.
ANY SURPRISES? – 3 / 5
Verstappeb binning his Red Bull on the first lap was quite the surprise. Lando Norris’ pace out front becoming less of a surprise.
SEASON IMPORTANCE – 3 / 5
Is there a Norris Championship charge coming? If so, this race may end up having lots of season importance.
ENDING – 3 / 5
A combination of the battle between Russell and Hamilton and both drivers being grumpy over the radio made the ending ok.
OVERALL RATING – 17 / 30
Not a bad race. Good win for Lando Norris, who pulled off a great move for the win. Pity the rain didn’t stay or return.
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