World champion Max Verstappen claimed another Formula 1 victory after claiming success at the Chinese Grand Prix today. Verstappen completed a perfect weekend in Shanghai, after celebrating success in the sprint, in qualifying and in the race itself, reports BTA.
In the race itself, he dominated from start to finish and left no doubt about his superiority. So the entry of two safety cars during the race also helped a lot.
The only moments of concern for the driver from the Netherlands was at the start of the race when he had to fend off attacks from the Ferrari cars. Second to the Red Bull star was McLaren's Lando Norris, 13.733 seconds behind. Third is the other Red Bull pilot – Sergio Perez, trailing at 19.160.
For the winner, it was his fourth consecutive success in five races since the start of the campaign, as well as his 58th career win overall. The only race in which Verstappen did not triumph as a winner was in the last week of March in Australia, where Ferrari's Carlos Sainz took first. Verstappen's time is 1:40:52.554 hours.
Second place for Norris was the Woking-based team's best result of the campaign so far. Norris started the race from fourth place and never dropped down to finish second.
Top 6 was completed today by the two Ferrari cars – Charles Leclerc (Monaco) in fourth place at 23.623 seconds, and by Carlos Sainz – at 33,983. Mercedes' George Russell was sixth in 38.724.
On lap number 21 came a race break when the virtual safety car was brought in after Valtteri Bottas retired on track.
This allowed Leclerc and Norris to make their first and only pit stops, with the latter re-emerging in third, taking advantage of the little time lost in the pit lane. Immediately afterwards, however, a real safety car was brought in, which prevented only Sergio Perez, who lost his second place to Norris.
The race was resumed on lap 27, but only for a moment, literally. Lance Stroll and Daniel Ricciardo made contact at the corner before Tsunoda was forced to retire, hit by Kevin Magnussen. And that led to another safety car. The second restart came on lap 32, after which Verstappen dominated and Perez returned to the podium by passing Leclerc on lap 39.