F1: Verstappen outduels Perez to win the Miami GP

–by Mark Cipolloni–

Setting incredible pace on his used hard Pirelli Tires, Max Verstappen drove past his Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez on lap 48 of 57 and motored away on his then fresher tires to win the Miami GP for the 2nd year in a row.

In front of a sold-out crowd, Verstappen opened up a gap of 5 seconds over his teammate, who could not stop the Dutchman from his 3rd win of the year and his 38th career F1 win.

Verstappen started 9th, drove through the field quickly and won his 4th straight F1 race on USA soil, setting the fastest lap in the process.

That Red Bull was too quick for the rest today, but all credit to the Dutchman who started ninth, made swift work of the others and then put in a brilliant stint on the hard compound to make it easy in terms of picking off his teammate.

It was the 4th 1-2 for Red Bull, but by no means was it a boring race given the somewhat inverted grid. Verstappen, Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton all started mired in the middle of the field and had to battle past many cars.

“It was a good race, stayed out of trouble in the beginning and yeah, has a clean race,” said a happy Verstappen after yesterday’s setback.

“I could stay out long on the hard tires, and that’s what made the difference. Yesterday was a setback, today we kept it calm, we kept it clean. Winning from P9 is very satisfying.”

“I gave it my all,” said a smiling Perez, who knew he had nothing for his faster teammate.

“The first stint was poor with the graining, and that compromised our race as we had too much of a difference on tires. Well-deserved win for Max. I think the medium initially was really poor, worse than expected. I need to analyze what went wrong, as we had a bad race.”

Fernando Alonso finished a distant 3rd for Aston Martin, holding ff the Mercedes of George Russell and the Ferrari of Carlos Sainz Jr. who rounded out the top-5.

“The car is amazing, a bit of a lonely race,” said a happy Alonso.

“We did expect stronger opposition, but the Ferraris were worse than expected today. We take the podium, and going into the triple-header, hopefully we can keep on going.

“We want more, at least a second place, maybe Monaco, maybe Barcelona we have a possibility.”

Alonso predicted Verstappen would pass him on lap 25.  He passed him on lap 14, Alonso’s car number.

Lewis Hamilton was a distant 6th in the 2nd Mercedes, a good recovery from his 13th starting position.

Verstappen now has 119 points on the year and opened up the gap on his teammate from 6 to now 14 points.

All 20 cars finished the race, but American Logan Sargeant was dead last after breaking his front wing in an opening lap skirmish.

Plenty to get excited about – but there’s no disguising the fact that Verstappen will be very hard to beat moving forwards.

After a weekend off, F1 returns with a triple header – Imola, Monaco and Barcelona.

How the Race Unfolded

When the lights went out, Pérez got away well and took the lead ahead of Alonso and the Ferrari of Carlos Sainz. Behind them, Haas’ Kevin Magnussen made a poor start and dropped back to seventh as Pierre Gasly moved to fourth ahead of Mercedes’ George Russell and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.

Meanwhile, Verstappen, on Hard tires, lost out at the start when Alfa Romeo’s Valterri Bottas made a good start and rose to eighth. However, the Dutchman quickly moved past Alpine’s Esteban to take back P9.

That became P8 on the next lap and then at the end of lap 3 the Dutchman closed up behind the dueling pair of Leclerc and Magnussen and when the Haas driver tried to fight back after Leclerc had overtaken him, Verstappen moved to inside and powered past both under DRS as they crossed the line.

The Red Bull driver closed up to Russell on lap nine and passed the Mercedes driver under braking into Turn 17. He chose the same place to muscle past Gasly on the next lap and then on lap 14 he passed the Spaniard under DRS into Turn 11. His next target was Alonso, and with pace to spare he eased past the Aston Martin driver, who offered little resistance, on the following lap.

The medium-tire starters now began to pit and Pérez made his stop at the end of lap 20. The Mexican switched to Hard tires in 2.2 seconds and rejoined in fourth place behind Alpine’s Esteban Ocon who had started on Hard tires. Verstappen, still on his starting Hards, now led the race.

After Pérez reclaimed P2 from Ocon shortly before half distance the race became a tactical battle between Pérez, on fresh Hard tires, and Verstappen on aging Hards and with a stop for Mediums to come.

Pérez, 16 seconds behind his teammate pushed to close the gap while also trying to protect his tires for the inevitable fight at the end of the race, but as Verstappen continued to put in strong lap times despite the age of his tires, it soon became clear that the Mexican was fighting a losing battle.

After an exceptional final phase of his long opening, during which he set a cluster of fastest lap times, Verstappen made his sole stop of the race on lap 45 and took on Medium tires. He emerged just 1.6 seconds behind his teammate and on lap 47 he closed up to his teammate and attacked into Turn 17.

Pérez defended well, but on the run to Turn 1 at the start of the next lap he drew alongside and after a brief tussle got past to take the lead and ultimately the win.

And 10 laps later, Max crossed the line five seconds ahead of Pérez to take a second consecutive Miami Grand Prix and his third win of the season.

Race Results