In nine races that go into the 2022 season and that were fulfilled with the Canadian Grand Prix, Max Verstappen He has climbed to first place on the podium six times and was third on one occasion, that is, his inertia as current champion makes the Formula 1 category accustomed to seeing him always awarded. What mindset drives you to victory?
“It has nothing to do with confidence or because I am world champion now that I finally feel like I belong here or wherever. I want to try to win more. I already said that if I win a championship, my goal in F1 is achieved and whatever else come later it’s just a bonus and I’ll enjoy it. I think my motivation is even higher now to go back and try to get that feeling or try to feel it again,” he said. Verstappen to CNN Sport last February, before the Miami Grand Prix.
At the Gilles-Villeneuve circuit in Montreal the 24-year-old, driving his 150th Grand Prix, confirmed his seat at the top of the drivers’ championship and Red Bull’s in the constructors’ championship. In wet conditions over the weekend, the Dutchman took a comfortable pole position, his second since the race in Italy.
Verstappen’s win was Red Bull’s sixth win in a row and is close to a record set by Sebastian Vettel when he won with the Austrian team nine in a row in 2013. Second came Carlos Sainz who now has 11 Formula 1 podium finishes without a victory, just two short of the record held by Nick Heidfeld, who finished second in back-to-back Canadian Grands Prix in 2007 and 2008. Third place went to Lewis Hamilton, his second in 2022 and first since the inaugural race of the year. in Bahrain. However, he is no shadow of the dominant races he left, more than a year ago, the seven-time F1 champion with Mercedes.
“It feels great to be in the middle of the battle. For a second, I kept up with these guys. It has given me and the team a lot of hope that there is more to come from this car, the potential is there,” said Hamilton, who beat teammate George Russell for the second time this season.
Russell finished in position four maintaining his record of finishing all races in the top five this season. He remains the only driver to score in every race in 2022.
Following the retirement of Sergio Pérez, Red Bull now has more mechanical retirements this season than ferrarifour to three.
“A shame not to have Sergio Pérez on the podium. The championship is changing; Unfortunately he already has as many flaws as Max, we have to understand and attend to. It’s too early to rule anyone out, we’re not even halfway there, there’s still a lot of championship left”, Chris Horner.
Despite Checo’s departure, the Mexican driver added 129 points and remains sub-leader in the World Cup.
“Everything went wrong for us this weekend, going to zero hurts a lot. Reliability problems continue to hurt us, I lost drive and I was totally neutral and I didn’t make any progress. It’s a shame we lost this day. We had a good strategy, we had everything to recover and fight for the podium today,” he said.
After a two-week break, the season returns for a series of European races, starting with the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, Hamilton’s home, where he hopes the fast nature of the track suits the Mercedes, assuming that they can keep under control the rebounding problems that have plagued much of their season.