Formula 1 News: Verstappen leads Red Bull 1-2 in Saudi Arabia

Defending World Champion Max Verstappen led all but two laps to win the 2024 Saudi Arabian GP over his Red Bull Honda teammate Sergio Perez.

–by Mark Cipolloni–

Verstappen grabbed the lead from pole on the fast Jeddah street circuit, lost it for two laps to Lando Norris during pit stops and motored to his 56th career F1 win by over 13-seconds.

It was Verstappen’s 100th career podium and 9th straight win going back to Japan last year. It was Verstappen’s 19th win out of the last 20.

Verstappen is not only the youngest driver to reach 100 podiums, but he’s the only driver to hit 100 while still being in their 20s. He has 100 in 188 starts.

Still only 26 years old, it goes to show that he probably could rewrite the entire F1 record book if he decides to stick around long enough.

“I think overall a fantastic weekend for the whole team but also for myself as I felt great in the car. The last few laps with the backmarkers and old tires was a bit slippery, but we could manage it with the gap behind,” said Verstappen.

“Ideally, you don’t want to do such a long stint with the tire, but we had to.”

He now has 51 points after winning the first two races of the year while his teammate Perez is in 2nd 3ith 36 points.

Despite a 5-second penalty for an unsafe pitstop release, Perez finished 2nd ahead of the Ferrari of Charles Leclerc, who completed the podium positions.

“We definitely made some good progress, it was a shame we qualified out of the front row as Charles made it tough to get through, and it was a compromised race with the Safety Car so early,” said Perez.

“It’s a great day for the team, we just have to keep this momentum going – we still have some bits to tidy up but our time will come.”

Leclerc also took the fastest lap point on the final lap.

“We had quite a good pace, as I got the fastest lap at the end. It was a bit of a boring race as Red Bull were too quick and behind we had a gap, but we took the maximum points we could today,” said Leclerc.

“All in all, it’s definitely one of the most physical race tracks of the season, it’s very warm but also with the neck.

“[Bearman] has done an incredible job, I think today he’s been incredible – seventh in your first race having only done FP3 is very impressive.”

Oscar Piastri came home 4th for McLaren after a heated battle with Lewis Hamilton, and Fernando Alonso rounded out the top-5 for Aston Martin, over 35-seconds behind Verstappen.

George Russell was 6th for Mercedes and Oliver Bearman drove a solid race to come home in 7th in his F1 debut for Ferrari. A pretty faultless race to score points on his debut. The teenager has done an incredible job after such a late call-up. Hats off to him.

“I’m a little tired, you can probably see I don’t look my best! that was incredible, I can’t believe how fast we can push,” said a happy Bearman.

“And at the end, those two guys on the softs, the countdown seemed like it was going slower than normal.

“I felt I had a little in hand to handle it, I did my fastest lap on the final one – I wanted to push it and see what I could do.”

Norris was 8th ahead of Lewis Hamilton and Nico Hulkenberg in 10th for the final point.

2024 Saudi Arabian GP Results – 50 Laps