Max Verstappen claimed an important victory at the inaugural Miami Grand Prix, which saw him close the gap to championship leader Charles Leclerc to 19 points.
Verstappen performed brilliantly on Sunday at the Miami International Autodrome, following a somewhat disappointing qualifying.
The Dutchman missed out on the majority of Friday practice, after suffering yet more reliability issues.
A mistake on his final Q3 lap saw the reigning champion qualify in third, behind both Ferraris.
Verstappen did brilliantly though to overtake Carlos Sainz Jr on the first lap, and then overtake Leclerc eight laps later.
Red Bull Racing’s design chief Adrian Newey explained the challenges the newly built circuit presented.
“They’ve used granite as the substrate, and the way the tyres behave on that has been a bit different to what we’ve experienced at the first four [races],” Newey said.
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“There was a bit of learning to do and, to be perfectly honest – because of all the red flags we’d had in the practice sessions – nobody really got proper, good long runs in.
“[We didn’t know] exactly how the tyres were going to behave in the race, how far we would get with the Mediums.
“Once we did stop with the Mediums, if we were forced to stop early, would we get one stop on the Hards from the end? It’s so difficult.”
Verstappen’s victory comes on the back of winning at the previous round.
Prior to the first-ever race in Miami, Verstappen claimed victory at the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix in what was a dominant display.
The 2021 world champion’s winning margin would’ve been much larger at Miami, had it not been for a late Safety Car which bunched up the pack.
Lando Norris and Pierre Gasly collided on the exit of Turn 7, resulting in the McLaren driver retiring from the race.
The Safety Car gave Leclerc a free-ticket to close right-up on Verstappen, ultimately though the Ferrari driver had no answer for the Dutchman’s pace.
With Red Bull appearing to have the fastest car this season, Newey was asked on the F1 Nation podcast if “things are looking pretty good” for the team.
“It’s so close, you really can’t say that,” he said.
“We’ve only got to look back at last season, [and] the few races where we had some pretty good, dominant wins – Austria, Mexico – and then the next race it swings around.
“You really can’t be relaxed at this point, that’s for sure.”