Track Torque: George Russell wins in Austria
The big spectacle of the race had been the great fight between Lando Norris and Max Verstappen but it ended badly.
In a race of mixed fortunes at the Austrian Grand Prix, George Russell took the spoils in the hills of the beautiful Styrian mountains.
It was the birthplace of Toto Wolff, the boss of the Mercedes team, and he was very happy indeed.
After competing initially with Russell, teammate Lewis Hamilton ended up a slightly disappointing fourth.
The big spectacle of the race, however, had been the great fight between Lando Norris and Max Verstappen.
Unfortunately, the fabulous duel between the two of them ended in disaster.
When Norris was trying to pass Verstappen, the two cars took each other out of contention, resulting in two damaged cars having to return to the pits.
Verstappen received a penalty for this and eventually finished fifth, with Norris out.
Meanwhile, Russell, who was running in third position, was quick to pick up the pieces and lead the race to the finish.
It was the second win of his career.
To complete the picture of the top five was Oscar Piastri in the second McLaren and Carlos Sainz in his Ferrari, sharing the podium in second and third positions respectably.
Nico Hulkenberg, who has been pushing very hard lately in his Haas Ferrari, came home sixth after a very good drive, beating Sergio Perez, who was seventh by less than a second.
It is worth noting that Hulkenberg is joining Audi next year with, we hope, another top-flight driver.
His teammate, Kevin Magnussen, was up with the group and came in eighth, five seconds behind Perez.
Daniel Ricciardo, who is driving to retain a top seat, was next in ninth place after a very determined drive.
Pierre Gasly, in the first of the Alpine Renaults and sitting in the slipstream of Ricciardo, picked up the final point-scoring position.
Charles Leclerc, in his Ferrari with Esteban Ocon in the second Alpine, both finished outside the points in 11th and 12th places, respectively.
Leclerc, in particular, was very disappointed with his result.
Last week, I erroneously left out Austria and spoke about Silverstone, which is now only seven days away.
The best of British is really worth waiting for; it should be a very exciting race at one of the fastest tracks of the high-speed bunch.
Let us hope for beautiful weather and clean racing at this track, where slipstreaming and overtaking are highly possible.
God save the King.
DRIVERS
1 Max Verstappen 237
2 Lando Norris 156
3 Charles Leclerc 150
4 Carlos Sainz 135
5 Sergio Perez 118
6 Oscar Piastri 112
7 George Russell 111
8 Lewis Hamilton 85
9 Fernando Alonso 41
10 Yuki Tsunoda 19
TEAM
1 Red Bull 355
2 Ferrari 291
3 McLaren 268
4 Mercedes 196
5 Aston Martin 58
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