Oscar Piastri on Sunday won the Miami Grand Prix for his third straight win this year, helping McLaren to a strong finish.
Thanks to Piastri’s win, McLaren becomes the first constructor to finish both the sprint and race in P1 and P2. Lando Norris finished second in the race, while Norris and Piastri finished first and second in the sprint respectively.
As a result Piastri now widens in lead over his teammate Norris to nine points in the drivers’ standings.
In stark contrast to McLaren, Red Bull’s weekend could be summed up as disastrous. After being in a competitive spot for a podium finish in the race, a mistake by the Red Bull pit crew led to an unsafe release that resulted in a 10-second penalty for Max Verstappen and zero points. Similarly, in the race on Sunday, despite starting from pole position, Verstappen was easily eclipsed by both Piastri and Norris, and eventually George Russell. Verstappen finished fourth.
Verstappen now trails Piastri by 19 points and lead Russell by 11 points for third place in the drivers’ standings. Despite the result in Miami, not all was bad for Verstappen, as he welcomed his first child, Lily on Thursday.
With Red Bull showing a surprising large lack of pace compared to McLaren on the Miami Grand Prix circuit, the Spanish Grand Prix cannot come soon enough; a new set of technical regulations could lead to some form of pace advantage for Red Bull.
