Disqualifications, strategy & mistakes – F1 back to its unpredictable best

Formula 1 heads into its summer break after another engrossing race that wrapped up many of the year’s storylines into one afternoon.

George Russell lost what would have been one of the most extraordinary victories of the season when his car was disqualified for being 1.5kg underweight after the Belgian Grand Prix.

But Mercedes nevertheless confirmed their remarkable revival after a difficult start to the season because Lewis Hamilton inherited victory from his team-mate, who the seven-time champion had crossed the line right behind.

It was Mercedes’ third win in four races – a remarkable achievement given they were the fourth and sometimes even fifth-best team over the first five races of the season.

Every race since Miami in May, when Lando Norris scored his breakthrough win for McLaren to stem the early Red Bull domination, has been close and unpredictable.

“We didn’t expect to be competing with the McLarens or the Red Bulls at this point in the season with how we started off,” Hamilton said. “So for us to now have closed up, it’s going to be one hell of a second half of the season for sure.”

“We need to remain with both feet on the ground,” team boss Toto Wolff said. “The swings of performance – you see a trend positive on our side and with some other teams you see a negative trend, but I don’t think we should pre-empt how the second half of the season is going to go.

“We can be carefully optimistic but we have to prove [ourselves] with 10 races to go.”

Norris was left to rue another small but decisive error after running wide at the first corner dropped him from fourth to seventh and left him consigned to fifth place in a race the McLaren driver started as one of the favourites.

Afterwards, Norris said he was “maybe just trying a bit too hard and paying the price for that.”

And although Max Verstappen was unable to match the pre-race predictions that he would come through from 11th after a grid penalty for using too may engine parts, his eventual fourth place still extended his championship lead over Norris to 78 points.

So a championship in which every race is now impossible to predict because the fight at the front between Red Bull, McLaren and Mercedes – and sometimes Ferrari – is so close, still looks almost inevitably as if it will end up in Verstappen’s hands.

But Belgium underlined what a shame it is from the perspective of objective interest in competitive racing that McLaren and Mercedes started the season slowly.

How different the prospect for the final 10 races would be had Verstappen not romped to four wins in the first five races while those two teams struggled to find their feet.

Mercedes, while still fluctuating in performance from race to race, are on a roll. McLaren, the most consistent front-runners, have let certainly one and perhaps two wins go begging. And Verstappen, despite his comfortable championship lead, is almost begging his Red Bull team to up their game.

“A lot of the other guys, they have done great races,” Verstappen said. “But they’re quite far behind in the championship.

“For me, with the car that at the moment probably isn’t the quickest in the race, it’s about just limiting the damage and trying to be as close as I can every single time. And that’s what we have been doing lately.

“Naturally I would just hope that we can find a little bit more performance, because it will make our lives a bit easier in the race.”

Verstappen sounds like he is expecting a rearguard battle for the remainder of the season – albeit it should not be an especially difficult one given the size of his points advantage and the quality of his driving.

Norris would have to close on him by an average eight points a race for the remainder of the season to beat him to the championship. That’s doable, but difficult.

In the constructors’ championship, though, Red Bull are comparatively on the ropes. Two cars score in that, and McLaren again outscored Red Bull in Belgium thanks to Oscar Piastri’s second place in addition to Norris’ fifth.

They are now just 43 points behind Red Bull, and McLaren’s quest to end the season as constructors’ champions – for what would be the first time in 25 years – is well on course.

Red Bull’s problem is that only one car is scoring big points. Verstappen’s team-mate Sergio Perez had the latest in a long line of underwhelming races, dropping from a strong second place on the grid to finish the last of the leading group of cars.

He now looks certain to be replaced over the summer break, just two months after a new two-year contract was signed that was meant to keep the Mexican in his seat until the end of 2026.

Reserve driver Liam Lawson and RB’s Daniel Ricciardo are contending to replace him.

McLaren have more upgrades to come in the final 10 races of the season after the summer break – they have so far deployed fewer than Red Bull. If they can iron out some of their small errors, they will make even faster progress.

“I just need to reset,” said Norris, whose error in absentmindedly running wide into the gravel at the first corner trying to avoid contact cost him dearly.

“I have given away a lot of points over the last three or four races because of stupid stuff – mistakes, bad starts, Turn One now.

“It’s just silly things, not even difficult stuff. Turn One, stay out of trouble, try and make sure there’s a gap to not get hit and put myself off the track.

“The pace is good, the team is doing an amazing job. In a way I just want to continue because we’re in good form, the pace was strong today but the last two or three races I’ve just not clicked a much as I needed to and given up a lot of points and will come back stronger.”

Team principal Andrea Stella was forgiving. “Lando got a bit distracted from what was happening on the inside and ran out of track,” Stella said. “It is marginal things. It just requires a little adjustment here and there.

“We work with Lando and Oscar to try and see all the opportunities in which we can improve individually but also collaborate better to either be more prepared or use better our abilities and talents.

“It doesn’t necessarily change our attitude, but it gives us some elements to analyse as to how some of the missed opportunities manifest themselves.

“For Lando, for instance, it looks like statistically there are some opportunities that tend to happen in the early stages of the race.

“So we need to check whether this is early stages of the race for a reason or it’s just random but like any other athlete or driver, Lando with the support of the team will have to think what can I do better to make sure we capitalise on the good work we are doing.”

Piastri, too, was not faultless, despite following up his maiden win in Hungary last weekend with a strong third place on the road, right behind the Mercedes drivers as he crossed the line, and being elevated to second by Russell’s disqualification.

He missed his marks at his final pit stop, and cost himself two seconds, which may have cost him the chance to win, but given the unexpected difficulty of overtaking in the race probably made no difference.

Small errors notwithstanding, that’s now 10 consecutive races in which they have scored a podium finish.

Stella said: “I keep hearing McLaren has the best car but I keep pouring water on the fire. There are four cars that are pretty much at the same level and there is a bit of variability which is a function of of the track and even the conditions to some extent, like today Mercedes did a good job.”

Ferrari, too, were in the fight in Belgium, Charles Leclerc finishing just eight seconds from the winner and confirming that they have got on top of their bouncing issues introduced by an upgrade four races ago.

“The competition was really high today,” Russell said, before he was disqualified. “It felt like the pace between myself, Lewis, Oscar and the Red Bulls, Charles as well, it was so, so close, which was a real surprise for everyone. So it’s going to be a real battle.

“If the season started in Montreal (Mercedes’ first genuinely competitive race), the championship standings would be looking very, very different.

“It’s going to be great. There’s so much motivation from all the other teams to get back to the front, from McLaren, from Ferrari, from ourselves. So for sure, it’s not going to be easy. And, you know, hopefully we see a good fight on our hands into next year.”