The crowd favourite Max Verstappen scored a popular victory at Red Bull Racing’s home race as Mercedes’ challenge imploded in a dramatic Austrian Grand Prix.
Verstappen headed the Ferraris of Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel, who stole the championship lead from Lewis Hamilton by one point after Mercedes turned a one-two in qualifying into a double retirement.
Poleman Valtteri Bottas retired with a gearbox problem while a strategy error under the ensuing virtual safety car ruined Hamilton’s race and a loss of fuel pressure forced him to a late retirement.
Hamilton and Raikkonen jumped Bottas on the run to Turn 1, with the leaders three-wide, before Raikkonen tucked into Hamilton’s slipstream and attacked into Turn 3 but locked up and ran wide.
That allowed Verstappen to challenge him on the run out of the corner but Max was rebuffed aggressively and Bottas was able to re-pass both on the outside of Turn 4.
Verstappen got inside Raikkonen two corners later and a slight nudge on The Iceman’s left-rear wheel pushed him wide and allowed the Red Bull driver to sneak through.
Bottas offered no threat to Hamilton before slowing on lap 14 and retiring on the escape road at Turn 4 with a loss of hydraulic pressure.
That triggered a virtual safety car under which the frontrunners all stopped except for Hamilton, a mistake that Mercedes chief strategist James Vowles came on the radio to apologise for.
Verstappen rejoined from his pitstop 13 seconds behind Hamilton, who ran ten laps without being able to stretch out the gap and eventually stopped.
That dropped him to fourth, handing Verstappen the lead, but Hamilton’s misery continued a few laps later when Vettel forced his way past on the grass on the way up to Turn 3 and aggressively ran Hamilton wide on the entry to corner.
Hamilton was gifted a position back just after mid-distance when Daniel Ricciardo had to pit to change tyres after battling a blistering left-rear.
He gave chase to Vettel after receiving another apology from Vowles over the radio but then had to make his own forced stop for the same reason as Ricciardo on lap 52.
Hamilton’s race lasted just another dozen laps before a loss of fuel pressure forced him off the road at Turn 3 and into retirement on the left-hand side of the circuit on the run down to Turn 4.
That ended a run off 33 consecutive races in the points for Hamilton, whose last retirement was his spectacular exit from the 2016 Malaysian Grand Prix with an engine failure.
His dramatic race gave the top three an easy run to the podium, with Raikkonen closing to two seconds of Verstappen by the end but not troubling the 20-year-old and likewise being unchallenged by Vettel.
Ricciardo should have finished fourth in Hamilton’s absence but had already retired with an apparent gearbox problem when Hamilton stopped.
That meant Romain Grosjean ended his point-less start to the 2018 season in style with fourth place for Haas, the best result in the American team’s fledgling Formula 1 history.
His teammate Kevin Magnussen battled back from losing places after not pitting under the Bottas-induced virtual safety car to finish fifth and net Haas a huge points windfall.
Esteban Ocon and Sergio Perez took advantage of the chaos to rise to sixth and seventh from P11 and P15 on the grid, ahead of pitlane starter Fernando Alonso.
The McLaren driver ran P19 early on and, after complaining at that point to his team over the radio that he refused to run in that position all race, used the VSC and a strong, long second stint to charge to eighth late on.
That included an aggressive move on Charles Leclerc, who reclaimed ninth on the last lap from teammate Marcus Ericsson after the Sauber driver was let by to try to catch and pass Alonso on fresh tyres.
While that bid failed, Ericsson was still able to complete a double-points finish for Sauber after an extremely long first stint on softs and late charge on fresh supersofts.
Nico Hulkenberg and Brendon Hartley joined the three frontrunners in retiring from the race.
Renault’s Hulkenberg suffered a spectacular engine failure early on while Hartley stopped near the end after a bizarre mechanical failure forced him off-track at the penultimate corner and eventually forced him to stop at Turn 2.
So an entertaining race at the Red Bull Ring. Full of action, drama and overtaking. Many congratulations to Max Verstappen in winning and for Sebastian Vettel recovery from his grid penalty to take the championship lead by a single point.
It’s quite remarkable that both Mercedes were forced to retire. The last time the team suffered a double DNF was at the 2016 Spanish Grand Prix. Ironically Verstappen scored his win that day followed by the Ferraris of Raikkonen and Vettel.
The next race is the British Grand Prix and with strong home support, Lewis Hamilton is determined to strike back.
Austrian Grand Prix, race results:
1 Max Verstappen Red Bull-Renault 71 1h21m56.024s
2 Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari 71 1.504s
3 Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 71 3.181s
4 Romain Grosjean Haas-Ferrari 70 1 Lap
5 Kevin Magnussen Haas-Ferrari 70 1 Lap
6 Esteban Ocon Force India-Mercedes 70 1 Lap
7 Sergio Perez Force India-Mercedes 70 1 Lap
8 Fernando Alonso McLaren-Renault 70 1 Lap
9 Charles Leclerc Sauber-Ferrari 70 1 Lap
10 Marcus Ericsson Sauber-Ferrari 70 1 Lap
11 Pierre Gasly Toro Rosso-Honda 70 1 Lap
12 Carlos Sainz Renault 70 1 Lap
13 Lance Stroll Williams-Mercedes 69 2 Laps
14 Sergey Sirotkin Williams-Mercedes 69 2 Laps
15 Stoffel Vandoorne McLaren-Renault 65 Not running
– Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 62 Retirement
– Brendon Hartley Toro Rosso-Honda 54 Retirement
– Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull-Renault 53 Retirement
– Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 13 Hydraulics
– Nico Hulkenberg Renault 11 Power Unit
Drivers’ standings:
1 Sebastian Vettel 146
2 Lewis Hamilton 145
3 Kimi Raikkonen 101
4 Daniel Ricciardo 96
5 Max Verstappen 93
6 Valtteri Bottas 92
7 Kevin Magnussen 37
8 Fernando Alonso 36
9 Nico Hulkenberg 34
10 Carlos Sainz 28
11 Sergio Perez 23
12 Esteban Ocon 19
13 Pierre Gasly 18
14 Charles Leclerc 13
15 Romain Grosjean 12
16 Stoffel Vandoorne 8
17 Lance Stroll 4
18 Marcus Ericsson 3
19 Brendon Hartley 1
20 Sergey Sirotkin 0
Constructors’ standings:
1 Ferrari 247
2 Mercedes 237
3 Red Bull-Renault 189
4 Renault 62
5 Haas-Ferrari 49
6 McLaren-Renault 44
7 Force India-Mercedes 42
8 Toro Rosso-Honda 19
9 Sauber-Ferrari 16
10 Williams-Mercedes 4
