Max Verstappen won the Japanese Grand Prix at a canter to claim Red Bull’s second consecutive Constructors’ championship.
It was an easy afternoon for Verstappen, whose only brief scare came off the line when both McLaren drivers took him side by side into the first turn. Oscar Piastri, starting from the front row, had to yield from the inside line, but Lando Norris swept from third around the outside and threatened to take the lead. Verstappen, however, positioned his car perfectly to force Norris to slot behind him through Turn 2, from where he was uninhibited to build an insurmountable margin.
A brief safety car to clear first-lap debris was only a momentary interruption, with the Dutchman charging to a formidable 19.3s victory. With Ferrari and Mercedes scoring only minor points, Red Bull Racing comfortably secured its sixth teams championship with six rounds remaining for the season.
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“Unbelievable weekend,” Verstappen said. “To win here is great … but of course the most important thing was to win the constructors.
“I’m very proud of everyone working at the track but also back at the factory. We’re having an incredible year and I’m very proud of everyone.”
Verstappen is now primed to claim the drivers’ championship in the sprint race at the Qatar Grand Prix, needing only to prevent Sergio Perez from outscoring him by six points.
McLaren teammates Norris and Piastri battled for second spot, with the Australian getting the benefit of a well-timed virtual safety car on lap 13 to boost his undercut past the Briton.
Norris waited four more laps before pitting and emerged more than seven seconds adrift of the sister car, but with fresher tires he had ferocious pace, reeling in Piastri by lap 24. They briefly battled, but after several radio messages from Norris insisting that he was the faster driver, McLaren swapped its cars, promoting the Briton into second place to stretch his legs.
The order remained unchanged at the second stops on laps 36 and 35 respectively, with Norris cruising to a 17.1s intra-team win.
“Another amazing day for us,” he said. “We couldn’t have asked for any more.
“We’re not close to Max but we’re not miles away either. We’re getting there. The progress we’ve made is outstanding. I’m proud of the team, the steps forwards we’re making every weekend.”
Piastri fell to fourth after his second stop behind the one-stopping George Russell, and after some sparring, the Australian slipstreamed around the outside of Russell at the first turn to secure his maiden podium.
“It feels pretty special definitely,” he said. “I’ll remember it for a very, very long time.
“I can’t thank the team enough for giving me this opportunity. There aren’t many people in the world who get this opportunity in their whole life; I’ve managed to have it in my first season.”
Russell attempted to cling valiantly to fourth place with his ambitious one-stop strategy, but Charles Leclerc’s 10-lap-newer rubber on a day of high degradation made short work of the Briton eight laps from home to snatch fourth.
Hamilton was next in the queue to punish Russell’s strategy, but it took a team order to maneuverer him past after some staunch defending from the younger Briton — motivated, perhaps, by Hamilton’s robust racing against his teammate in the first stint of the race that briefly had both under investigation by the stewards.
Hamilton tried to aid Russell’s defense by keeping him within DRS range, but Sainz had tires 14 laps younger, easily enough to overcome the same tactics he used to win last weekend’s Singapore Grand Prix and slingshot into sixth with three laps remaining.
The Spaniard pursued Hamilton for fifth place, but without a massive tire offset he was unable to get close enough to show the Briton a wheel, deciding the place in Mercedes’s favor.
Russell sunk to seventh, the gap to Fernando Alonso in eighth too great to be a threat, while Alpine teammates Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly completed the points-paying places.
Liam Lawson beat teammate Yuki Tsunoda to 11th ahead of Zhou Guanyu and Haas teammates Nico Hulkenberg and Kevin Magnussen.
The high-attrition race featured five retirements, starting with a first-lap crash between Valtteri Bottas and Alex Albon, the Alfa Romeo cutting across the track to thump the Williams in the side.
Williams rookie Logan Sargeant later speared into Bottas’s side in a lock-up at the hairpin. All three retired with terminal damage, as did Stroll, who suffered a broken rear wing.
Perez tangled with Hamilton, forcing him to stop for a new front wing early in the race, but a botched attempt to pass Magnussen at the hairpin broke his front wing again and earned him a 5s penalty for causing a collision.
The Mexican shortly afterwards retired the car, but the team sent him back out late in the race to serve his penalty rather than carry it into the next race as a grid drop, retiring him again after two laps.
