Russell leads Mercedes 1-2 as Verstappen secured 4th title at Las Vegas
Mercedes dominated the entire Las Vegas weekend and fielded the strongest car to enable George Russell to take his third career victory, ahead of Lewis Hamilton who recovered from 10th position. Carlos Sainz finished in third as 5th for Verstappen was enough for his 4th World Championship.
For the second time, the bright lights on the Las Vegas strip hosted Formula One, this time with George Russell starting from pole position and with Max Verstappen looking to secure his fourth Championship.
Everybody started on the medium tyre bar Perez, Bottaas and Colapinto on the hards and Fernando Alonso on the soft tyres.
When the lights went out Russell mainted the lead from pole, opting to quickly defend his position from the challenging Ferrari of Leclerc. Sainz lost second to his team mate and slotted in third, ahead of Gasly who dropped to fourth. Verstappen and Norris held position, followed by Tsunoda, Hulkenberg, Piastri and Hamilton.
The action in the first two laps was mainly provided by Lawson who got involved in a close fight with Magnussen. As the duo fought side by side through a sequence of corners, Magnussen eventually had to yield, costing him another place as Fernando Alonso happily got in between them to take 14th. The Spaniard's gamble for an early safety car failed however, leading to an early pitstop on lap 5 to drop back to the back of the pack.
Lap 5 saw Leclerc have a go for the lead coming very close twice until having to give in while being on the outside of Turn 1. At the same time Max Verstappen got a straightforward DRS overtake done on the main straight, passing Gasly for 4th.
Leclerc's challenge for the lead then quickly degraded, allowing Sainz to move up into second. Once Sainz passed Leclerc struggled further and quickly dropped into being a prey for Verstappen. The Dutchman didn't hestitate and used his first opportunity to pass the Ferrari with DRS. Leclerc as called in on lap 10, just like Norris. Both changed to hard tyres.
Meanwhile Hamilton managed to make strides by passing Piastri and Tsunoda as his Mercedes and Verstappen's Red Bull seemed to enjoy better tyre life.
Sainz pitted one lap after Leclerc did, but only after also getting passed by Verstappen. The Dutchman was callled in one lap later, leaving Russell and Hamilton to lead the pack, followed by Hulkenberg and Perez. Next up was a close bunch of cars, led by Magnussen, then Verstappen, Bottas, Colapinto, Sainz, Leclerc and Norris.
Although they all got through cleanly, Verstappen gained massively out of this as he had to pass only 2 cars in this pack, enabling to escape and build before the Ferraris and Norris got out of this pack.
On lap 14, after a blistering in-lap, Hamilton came out of the pits also in this pack, but only having to pass Magnussen. Hamilton was mind boggled coming into this bunch, saying "What the hell man, how many places have I just lost?". Still, quite a good affair for Hamilton as he clearly lost a lot less time coming through this bunch while also having a 5-lap tyre advange for the second stint. Hamilton went on to pass Norris for 6th place.
That pass sent him into another bunch as Leclerc was trying to make it past Perez. When he did, Hamilton only neeeded another half lap to make it past the Red Bull as well while Norris happily followed through before Turn 1.
Gasly meanwhile dropped out of the race after a frustrating exchange with his engineer. The Frenchman had reported no power but his race engineer quickly replied "everything looks ok to us". Surely, a few seconds later, smoke came out of the back of the Alpine and Gasly had no choice but to dive into the pits and retire from the race.
By lap 20 it was clear that Norris wasn't in contention at all. Following a worry about his tyres he rapidly lost contact with the cars ahead. Hamilton on the other hand seemed to have more pace than Leclerc but the straight line speed of the Ferrari seemed like a tough nut to crack. On top of that, Leclerc was going strong and driving faster than Verstappen and Sainz.
By lap 25, Leclerc had caught up with Sainz while Verstappen was only another 2 seconds further up the road. As Sainz then sort of held up Leclerc a bit, the pitstops started with Piastri being called in first, followed by Verstappen one lap later. The call came in late though so Verstappen didn't make the pit entry and completed another lap.
When Verstappen then pitted, Sainz allowed Leclerc past and then came into the pits after begging his team to make a pit call. Though the mechanics were ready, Sainz was told to stay out, leading him to cross the pit line on entry and go back onto the track for another lap. When he then pitted eventually he found himself 3 seconds down on Hamilton.
Things were even worse for Ocon as he was called in by Alpine without any mechanics ready, so he went through the pitlane, losing a lot of time, going around again before pitting.
As Hamilton set the fastest lap and came within DRS range of Verstappen on lap 30 it didn't take much for the Mercedes driver to make it past the Red Bull. Verstappen had his mind on the Championship and tyre degradation so he didn't really put up a lot of resistance as Hamilton breezed past.
After Leclerc pitted he found out how much Ferrari had lost during this round of pitstops. Having extended his stint by two laps cost him the same as what the pit confusion cost Sainz.
When the last stops were out of the way, Russell was out in front with more than 11 seconds ahead of his team mate. Verstappen ran in a sensible third place, followed by Sainz, Leclerc, Norris and Piastri.
Continuing his strong showing, Hamilton then started to quickly eat into the advantage of race leader George Russell. Leclerc meanwhile was also on fire and closed in on Sainz, who himself seemed slightly faster than Verstappen. The Dutchman calmly asked his engineer whether he should actually try to keep the Ferraris behind... surely a new question for his race engineer, but the answer was "I think you should, yes".
The Ferrari duo were really up Verstappen's heels on lap 41. Sainz only needed a single attempt to make it past. Leclerc thought he'd easily follow through the pit straight as well but then found Verstappen having too much of it, opting to not be passed by two Ferraris in a single lap. Leclerc struggled to make it past Verstappen and only managed to do so 6 laps later after Sainz had pulled away enough to not be too much of a towing help for the Dutchman.
Up in front Hamilton pushed on and continued to be on schedule to end up together with his team mate by the end of the race. Russell meanwhile was asked to pick up the pace to avoid a last lap fight.
3 laps from the end Hamilton realised he would fall short for victory so he backed out of the fight, opting to focus on a brilliant Mercedes 1-2 result on the back of the very very difficult Brazilian Grand Prix. Carlos Sainz finished in third place still while Max Verstappen secured his fourth World Championship title.
Lando Norris salvaged McLaren's pain by taking fastest lap after a late pitstop for soft tyres. Indeed, with McLaren's current struggles, every point matters for the Constructor's Championship battle as Ferrari come closer.
