The first half of the second stint looked just like the end of the first. Verstappen maintaining his cushion, Leclerc threatening but not quite getting on terms with Norris. A little way behind, McLaren had undercut Piastri past Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari and further back again the two Mercedes were in a no man’s land of their own. Sergio Perez could be of no help to Verstappen, having qualified outside the top 10, ran the first stint on the hard (a tyre which proved trickier than everyone expected) and then made no impact upon the Mercs.
That’s how it all looked set. Then Verstappen lost enough tread on his front tyres that they began to rapidly lose temperature. All he felt was the loss of front grip and maybe if he’d realised the nature of the problem he could have pushed harder rather than trying to do the right thing by being easy on them. Once they’ve cooled and the tread is thin, they stay cool. Hence Norris began eating dramatically into that lead and the last dozen laps were a dog fight, with Norris desperately trying to get within 1sec of the Red Bull at the DRS detection point just after Variante Alta – and Verstappen doing everything he could to prevent that.
Just as it seemed Norris had spent his rubber advantage in the chase, so the embers of the battle were re-lit as Verstappen had to switch to a tamer power unit mode in order to recharge the battery he’d just emptied in defending from Norris. Lando made one last bid to get within the DRS detection point just after Variante Alta, Verstappen could see him coming, knew what he would be trying to do – and so backed off early before the corner, losing Norris the advantage of momentum.
Even the tifosi were fired up over the McLaren vs Red Bull lead battle
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Would Norris have done anything different in hindsight? “Yeah, I would probably take out four holes of front wing and do the same again. Like Max said, once the tyres are where they are, you can’t actually do a lot. We were expecting it to be a little bit colder today than what it was. So we kind of set up the car more for colder conditions rather than hot. And I think I paid the price in general. So that’s why I had to do so much of a [gentle] introduction to the tyres and kind of bring them up so gently and look after them. Because if I didn’t, I just would have fallen off a cliff like the others did. So my only chance was to drive my race. And that meant being under pressure from Charles for more laps than I would have liked. But as soon as I kind of cleared the traffic and got back into my own rhythm, then I felt good with the car. The tyres kind of came back to me and I could push and I was happy. So from then on, the pace was amazing. And so it’s a good sign.”
It is indeed. For the sake of a competitive season.