Montreal — Max Verstappen has been so dominant in Formula One in recent years that it seems unusual to see him have to put in extra effort to win.
In Miami at the beginning of May, he was unable to prevent Lando Norris from winning after a safety car period went against him and allowed the McLaren driver to easily stop in the lead. Verstappen was forced to employ every bit of the skill that has won him a three-time world champion as Norris pushed him until the very last lap at Imola.
And in Montreal on Sunday, Verstappen was required to be at his very best once again. Through a wet and somewhat wild Canadian Grand Prix, the Red Bull driver was worked hard by the weather, by Norris and Mercedes’ George Russell, and by the lottery of incidents that ultimately paid him back for his Miami defeat.
Emerging from the car post-race, Verstappen had the extra buzz that comes from the heat of battle. “It’s a lot of fun to drive these kinds of races now and then,” he said.
“You don’t want it all the time, because that’s too stressful. But I had a lot of fun out there today.”
How Norris got into the fight
Montreal was an unusual place for Red Bull to call home because of the curbs and bumps that had recently shown the few shortcomings of the RB20 car. But compared to Monaco, when Red Bull led the entire weekend, it was expected that he would be nearer the lead.
That was confirmed in qualifying when Verstappen set a lap time that was exactly the same as Russell’s (who received pole by virtue of setting his time first), whom he closely followed during the early stages of the race due to the damp conditions. Given the challenging circumstances, Verstappen was unable to consider a lunge or a move too quickly, allowing Russell to play defense.
When Verstappen and Russell crept in on the back of the Mercedes, Norris was more than four seconds behind and taking his time to get into the lead. Russell’s slowing of Verstappen’s pace in the first sector alone gave Norris the opportunity to close the gap in as little as a second.
A rare Verstappen mistake at the start of Lap 17 allowed Norris to close as the track continued to dry, prompting race control to activate DRS. With that armed, Norris sailed past Verstappen at the end of the back straight on Lap 20 before picking off Russell in the same spot one lap later.
At this time, Norris tried to check out and run away. Like in the dry at Imola, where he had controlled his hard tires enough to mount a late charge, Norris maintained his lead and found a grip that Verstappen was unable to match, resulting in two seconds of extra laps. With a 10-second advantage, Norris had complete command of the race.
“Things were going beautifully,” Norris said right after jumping out of his car. “Of course, it’s Montreal. There’s always something that’s got to come into play.”
The safety car giveth, the safety car taketh away
That item was a safety car, and just as it helped Norris win his first race a month ago in Miami, it cruelly punished him tonight. On Lap 25 of 70, Logan Sargeant’s spin out of the first chicane left his Williams stranded in the middle of the circuit, necessitating the use of a safety car to clear it. Norris remained outside the pits, but Verstappen, Russell, and Oscar Piastri all dove in right away. It meant he could only finish third when he returned a lap later. Verstappen took the lead and he missed his opportunity to win. “What goes around comes around,” said Verstappen’s race engineer, Gianpiero Lambiase, on the radio. “That’s Miami back.”
“Sometimes (it) works for you and sometimes (it) works against you,” Verstappen said. “This time, it was working for us. I guess in that sense it’s 1-1 now this year. That’s racing.”
A difficult loss for Norris? Not exactly, though. After the podium ceremony, when he had a bit more time to reflect about the race, he appeared to have been less optimistic when he realized that it was not quite Miami. He admitted that not pitting right away was the incorrect decision that he and the crew made.
“We didn’t do a good enough job as a team to box when we should have done, and not get stuck behind the safety car,” Norris said. “I don’t think it was a luck or unlucky kind of thing, I don’t think it was the same as Miami. It’s on me and on the team.
“We should have won today.”
The late pressure on Verstappen
When the track began to dry out, Verstappen was able to gradually pull ahead of Norris, giving the field time to think about switching to slick tires. As the sky began to brighten, Norris flew past the chicane on intermediates, but Verstappen pitted on Lap 45, shortly followed by Russell.
Considering how quickly the track was drying and how important every lap on slicks over intermediates would be, the call sounded odd. McLaren reasoned that a few laps on a cold, new slick would be inferior than a worn intermediate at the conclusion of a stint. After turning the quickest lap possible and picking up some extra distance at Turns 1 and 2, when the track was at its wettest, Norris was instructed to “give it all” before pitting. By obtaining the overcut, he had a chance to at least pass Russell and, surprisingly, as he emerged from the pits, he was able to momentarily avoid Verstappen’s Red Bull.
When Norris attempted to apply more force, his frozen tires failed to find traction on a wet area, igniting and causing his McLaren to go sideways. Although Norris managed to catch the image with perfect timing, Verstappen had already sailed ahead.
But Norris never thought there was really a chance to jump Verstappen given the time to get his slicks up to temperature. “We were too far behind Max in the first place,” Norris said. “I probably pushed too late on that inter tire in the middle stint.”
A last chance presented itself, once more because of a sick Williams. With sixteen circuits to go, Carlos Sainz’s spinning Ferrari tagged Alex Albon and put him into the wall, resulting in the safety car being summoned. Verstappen was under pressure to keep up with Norris on tires of a similar age because he was already worried about his suspension stiffness and said he could not run over the curbs.
The reality was that Verstappen had it all in hand, saying after the race the suspension was “not particularly an issue.” He aced the restart, going eight-tenths clear of Norris before they even reached the start/finish line before adding a second on the first green flag lap. Norris didn’t have anything to fight back.
“It’s never an easy race, it’s easy to make mistakes, especially on the inters when they were almost becoming slicks,” Verstappen said. “It was very easy to go off. That made it very difficult.”
A reminder of Verstappen’s class
If Verstappen had had a better weekend, Formula One may be heading out of Canada thinking that a championship bout might be about to heat up following the rekindling of sparks in Monaco.
Rather, we suddenly find ourselves in the opposite circumstance. Verstappen’s lead in points has increased to 56 as a result of Leclerc’s retirement, and Red Bull now leads Ferrari by 49 points in the manufacturers’ standings. Red Bull’s alleged “weak track” resulted in one of the team’s largest point increases of the year.
“Max was really on the top of his game,” Red Bull team principal Christian Horner told Sky Sports post-race. “These conditions are a nightmare for everybody. Max working with the pit wall, his engineers, we got the calls right, we made the right adjustments at the right time. To win that race was a tricky one.”
Verstappen acknowledged that things have changed since last year, when he won 19 races and Red Bull was untouchable. “For whatever reason, it’s all a bit more difficult this year,” he said. “Some things are a bit hard to explain as well. Sometimes it feels like you are in a bit of a spiral and it takes time to get out of it. We are, for sure, on top of everything. There are always things you can do better. But yeah, we’ll come out of this weekend, analyze everything again and try to improve.”
There is definitely room for growth, but also this performance reminded us, as if we needed it, just how excellent Verstappen is. He does best in races where he is pushed to the limit, and on Sunday, he once again showed his mental toughness in addition to his extraordinary competence in all circumstances.
It is exciting to think about more events like this in the upcoming months. Even though Verstappen prevailed once more, he sure did have to earn it.
(Lead photo of Max Verstappen and Lando Noris: Mark Thompson/Getty Images)
