Winners

Max Verstappen

Max ♍Verstappen enjoyed the 🌞best weekend of his F1 career to date, showing levels of invincibility.

Whether he started from 14th, 20th or the pit lane, everyone reckoned Verstappe♔n was going to win with ease, and he did.

His qualifyingꦓ lap was scintillating, defeating his nearest challenger -ꦓ Carlos Sainz - by over 0.7s.

On race day, wit༒hin just eight laps, Verstappen was into fourth and the win was therefore a near-certainty.

Verstappen is in the form of his life. 

Of course, he has the quicke🌄st car but great champions before him had the same.

Like in the days of Schumacher in the early 2000s, his rivals were just resigned t✤o the fact that he was going to win - the same is the case with Verstappen

Esteban Ocon and Alpine

Alpine moved 20 points clear of McLaren in the constructors’ champi🅘onship with a 16-point points haul at ✨Spa.

Fernando Alonso finished fifth, while Estebဣan Ocon recovered from 16th on the grid to finish seventh.

The Fren𝕴chman out-qualified his teammate (without a tow) but dropped to the back of the grid due to engine penalties.

No doubt, Ocon w꧃as the quicker of the two Alpines thi⛦s weekend and his recovery was exemplary.

Good timing considering many are questioningℱ whether Alpine will cope wi♉thout Alonso in 2023.

Sebastian Vettel

Sebastian Vettel is ꦯshowing no signs of slowing down with another impressive race day performance for Aston Martin.

Even though the four-time champion announced his retirement from F1 ahead of the Hungarian Grand Prix, the German has🧸 been performing spectacularly this season.

He put a brave move on his teammate on the opening la𓂃p before pushing the Alpine of Alons🏅o hard during the middle of the race.

Another fine drive and well-deserved haul of points for V🔯ettel at Spa.

Alex Albon

Alex Albon ꧒continues to flourish since taking over from George Russell at the start of 2021.

The 🤪low downforce track characteristics of Spa played into Williams’ hands but Albon made the most of it.

While Albon qualified inside the top 10 on merit, it clearly didn’t have ꧒the pace to remain there in the race.

Albo𝔉n hung onto 10th, benefitting from Williams’ straight-line speed advantage to finish in the points for just the third🃏 time this year.

Losers

Ferrari

It was another bad day for Ferไrari and this time it wasn’t just down 🧸to strategy.

Ferrari simply didn’t have the pace to compete with Re🌌d Bull all weekend.

Even though Sainz started on pole (inherited thanks to Verstappen’s penalties), 😼he lost the lead within 18 laps.

The Spaniard was even put under pressure by George Russell in the latter stages, hig🌱hlighting just how much Ferrari were struggling.

Charles Leclerc’s race wasn’t straightforward after being forced to stop under the Safety Car after a tear-off from Verstappen’s 🐷helmet got stuck ♔in his front brake duct.

Leclerc then lost out on fifth-place following his failed attempt at the fastest lap for speeding in the pi🌺t lℱane.

Another disastrous day.

Lewis Hamilton

A rare misjudgement from Lewis Hamilton on the opening lap at Spa-Francorchamps forced him into an earl🐽yꩲ retirement.

Hamilton collided with former McLaren teammate Fernando Alo﷽nso at Les Combes, with the contact sending his Mercedes W13 airborne.

Given that Russell nearly finished on the podium, there’s no doubt that Hami♐lton would have had a g𝐆reat chance of doing so had he made it through Lap 1 unschathed. 

McLaren

McLaren endured an awful weekend at Spa with b🌌oth Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciardo finish⛄ing outside of the points.

Norris’ engine penalties put him to the back of the grid, while on the other side of൲ the garage, despite his good grid position, Ricciardo struggled for pace as he dropped behind Albon in the early phase of the race.

Ricciardo’s inability to re-pass Albon combi🍒ned with a poor strategy from McLaren cost him a shot at the points.

With Alpine scori❀ng points regularly now, it’s hard to see McLaren finishing fourth in ♚the constructors’ championship this year.

Alfa Romeo & Haas (again)

Once again, Alfa Romeo and Haas complete our winners and lo꧋sers.

Think back to the early part of the season, Kevin Magnussen and Valtteri Bottas finished fifth and sixth r🍌espectively in the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix.

Haas h𝕴ad the slowest car on race day, with Magnussen and Schumacher finishing ahead of only Nicholas Latifi.

For Alfa Romeo, Bottas was caught out by a spinning Latifi, while Zhou Guanyu fought hard but couldn’t make much progress🔴 as he finished 13th.