With the support of approximately 70,000 fans in Zandvoort and his “Orange Army”, Red Bull The star easily won his seventh victory in the 2021 campaign before his champion opponent, Valtery Bottas The third is Mercedes.
Seven-time world champion Hamilton complained about his team’s strategy in the last third of Sunday’s game and is now three points behind Verstappen.
After teammate Bottas ignored Hamilton’s previous best time order, the Englishman was also forced to chase the fastest lap on the final lap.
Verstappen’s orange army created one of the best Formula One atmospheres of modern times when the sport returned to the Netherlands 36 years later. Their star players did not disappoint the pole position victory.
The Dutch roared away from his starting mark, keeping Hamilton in the opening Tarzanbocht position in the 262-meter sprint, and at the end of the opening lap, he was already 1.7 seconds ahead of his opponent.
Hamilton blinked first and stopped for a new rubber on lap 20, but his Mercedes team was slowly replacing the Englishman’s front right tire, which took him a second.
Verstappen went to the pit in the next round and was ahead of Hamilton-the gap was reduced from 3 seconds to 1.5 seconds.
Mercedes rolled strategic dice by putting Bottas on a one-stop service. The main hope is that Bottas will slow Verstappen and allow Hamilton to undercut the next time the tire is replaced.
Verstappen eliminated Bottas’ 10-second advantage in just 7 laps.
“If you can, catching the ball and overtaking is absolutely crucial,” Verstappen’s racing engineer Giampiro Rambias told Verstappen.
On lap 30, at the exit of the last corner, Verstappen passed the ball into Bottas’ tractor and then rounded the outside of Mercedes on the straight to the start.
Hamilton followed Verstappen through, and within seven tenths saw his Red Bull opponent extend the lead to 1.6 seconds at the end of the lap, when Mercedes pulled the British into the 39th lap. In the second stop, the lead was extended to 3 seconds.
However, after Verstappen stopped in the next round, he easily led Hamilton.
“We bluffed too early,” the Mercedes driver complained. After a while, he appeared on the radio again. Hamilton said: “I still have a lot of life on that tire.” “I don’t know why we drove it.”
Hamilton began to attract Verstappen again, but racing engineer Peter Bonnington warned the 36-year-old driver to let his rubber one last time.
“I’m trying to close this gap, man,” Hamilton snapped. “bring it on.”
But Hamilton did not leave any impression on Verstappen.
Pierre Gasly finished fourth, and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz finished fifth and sixth respectively.
In a few incidents, Lando Norris and Sergio Perez bumped into the wheel in the race for ninth place. Perez and Norris ranked 10th for McLaren.
Supplementary report by the Press Association.
