George Russell’s daring one-stop strategy trumps Lewis Hamilton’s to give a resurgent Mercedes an unexpected one-two finish at Spa-Francorchamps, while Max Verstappen recovers from a grid penalty to finish fifth ahead of title rival Lando Norris
Sunday 28 July 2024, 16:28, UK
George Russell narrowly beat team-mate Lewis Hamilton with an unlikely one-stop strategy to take a stunning victory at the Belgian Grand Prix, helping Mercedes finish first and second, continuing their incredible comeback in Formula One.
In a race where rain-hit qualifying and a penalty for Max Verstappen had left the top of the grid in disarray and other teams expected to win, Hamilton’s blistering start from third place and a bold strategy from “tyre whisperer” Russell put Mercedes in the running to win.
With perennial leader Hamilton pitting twice for tyres whilst Russell only pitted once, the two teams played different strategies and their Mercedes teammates ran first and second in a tense closing stage, with the latter gaining track position but on tyres that were 16 laps old.
But Russell, who had requested a one-stop strategy over the team radio mid-race to move up from fifth place, withstood sustained pressure from Hamilton in the closing stages to win for the third time in his career and second in the last four races.
Mercedes hadn’t won a Formula 1 race in 19 months but won three of the final four races to revive a season that was threatening to be a major disappointment.
An eventful opening lap saw Lewis Hamilton overtake Sergio Pérez to move into second place.
McLaren’s Oscar Piastri finished third, just 1.1 seconds behind Russell, with the top three finishing in a fairly even contest.
Piastri was also ahead of Russell after a first-lap tussle with the race winner, but like Hamilton he pitted twice, conceding track position to the longer-running Mercedes. The Hungarian Grand Prix winner’s hopes of a back-to-back win were further jeopardised by losing time in his pit box during his second pit stop.
Returning to the track, Piastri caught and passed pole-sitter Charles Leclerc of Ferrari towards the end of the final lap to move up to third place, but ultimately did not have time to compete wheel-to-wheel with the Mercedes cars.
Lando Norris again started ahead of Piastri but a mistake on the exit of La Source dropped him back and again finished the first corner behind his teammate.
An eventful opening lap saw Lewis Hamilton overtake Sergio Pérez to move into second place.
Hold off by a recovering Verstappen during his first pit stop, Norris looked to have the quicker car but could not find a way past his title rivals, with Red Bull finishing fifth and McLaren sixth.
This meant Verstappen increased his title lead over Norris by two points to 78 heading into the summer break.
But an under-pressure Sergio Perez fell from second on the grid to eighth behind Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz, meaning Red Bull’s constructors’ title lead over McLaren narrowed again, to just 43 points behind the reigning champions.
Fernando Alonso struggled to finish in ninth place in his Aston Martin, while Frenchman Esteban Ocon beat RB’s Daniel Ricciardo to claim the final points after a strong weekend for Alpine.
Belgian Grand Prix Results: Top 10
1) George Russell, Mercedes
2) Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes
3) Oscar Piastri, McLaren
4) Charles Leclerc, Ferrari
5) Max Verstappen, Red Bull
6) Lando Norris, McLaren
7) Carlos Sainz, Ferrari
8) Sergio Perez, Red Bull
9) Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin
10) Esteban Ocon, Alpine
More to come…
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