I wasn’t trying to pass Hamilton or defend from Piastri

Max Verstappen said he never thought he would be able to fight Lewis Hamilton for victory in today’s sprint race.

The pair shared the front row of the grid but Hamilton led away at the start and was never headed over the 19-lap race.

Although Verstappen closed within DRS range of Hamilton at times earlier in the race, he slipped back and lost second place to Oscar Piastri.

“I saw Lewis saving [his tyres] quite nicely up front,” Verstappen told Sky. “So it was not even about trying to get by, it was just trying to keep Oscar behind me, trying to get in Lewis’s DRS to hang in there, basically.”

Verstappen did not move off-line to defend his position when Piastri got within DRS range of him on the main straight and moved to strike. He said there was no point trying to resist the McLaren because of the graining that was developing.

“We have too much deg[radation] because I think our base pace is off, so then you try to hang in there but [you] kill your tyres also.

“Then I didn’t put up a fight against Oscar on the straight, I just let him by. But then actually I think both of us started to struggle quite heavily. I think I wouldn’t have kept him behind anyway.”

George Russell gained several seconds on Verstappen towards the end of the race but wasn’t able to attack him as he came under pressure from Charles Leclerc.

“I think I also got lucky with the cars behind, they just started to fight a bit towards the end of the race,” said Verstappen. “But in general the pace was not that great, but still P3, it’s a decent result for us.”

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