Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton frustrated by ‘extreme' Spa rain call
The annual event is organised by the Alpine driver Pierre Gasly in memory of his close friend Anthoine Hubert, who died in 2019, at the age of just 22, after a multi-car collision in a wet feature Formula 2 race at Spa.
Hubert is far from the only driver to lose his life at the notoriously fast circuit, which is frequently subject to torrential rain. Just four years after his death, Dutch teenager Dilano van 't Hoff was also killed in similar wet conditions.
In total there have been 53 fatalities, including the deaths of four marshals, since Spa's opening in 1924.
All of which goes a long way to explaining why race control erred on the side of caution when weighing up when to pull the trigger on Sunday's Belgian Grand Prix, which was immediately preceded by torrential rain.
To call that caution excessive, however, would be an understatement. For the thousands of bedraggled fans watching from the grandstands, most of whom camp close by in the days leading up to the race, the delay was hugely frustrating. Earlier, they had watched a very entertaining F2 race in similarly damp conditions. Everyone was excited by the prospect of witnessing the world's best drivers try to negotiate the treacherous Spa circuit in the wet.
Millions more watching on television probably gave up and went and did something else.
The Fagnes chicane proved to be a challenge in our Feature Race at Spa! 👀 #F2 #BelgianGP pic.twitter.com/EAJgo4ZD0q
— Formula 2 (@Formula2) July 27, 2025
It was not a bad call. In the end, what we got was a pretty dull affair. By the time the race finally got under way, behind a safety car, 1hr 20min after the official start time, the track was rapidly drying. Race control still left the safety car out for four laps to clear more of the standing water, with the result that there was a dry line already visible. Race-winner Oscar Piastri needed just four race laps to consider switching to dry tyres and within eight laps of actual racing all the drivers were on slicks, and from then on it was processional.
What did the drivers think?
Both Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton, who have 11 F1 world titles between them, were firmly of the opinion that the race could have started on time at 3pm. 'It was not even raining by then,' Verstappen pointed out. 'OK there was quite a bit of [standing] water between Turns 1 and 5, but two laps behind the safety car then it would have been a lot more clear. So it's a bit of a shame.
'We [Red Bull] made a choice with the set-up for wet weather and then they only allowed us to drive in almost slick conditions! We spoke after [the recent wet-weather race at] Silverstone to be a little bit cautious with the decisions but this was at the other extreme for me.'
Hamilton agreed the race could have started on time, although he did say the drivers had to take some of the responsibility following those post-Silverstone chats. Race control was listening to the drivers' feedback as they lapped behind the safety car and nearly all of them, especially those at the back, were complaining it was unsafe.
'Lots of drivers in the last race said we shouldn't have restarted, because of a lack of visibility. So as soon as someone said 'visibility is pretty bad'...it wasn't great but it wasn't as bad as the last race… I think they just waited.
'They still did a good job. Of course we did miss some of the extreme wet-weather racing, which would have been nice.'
Fans short-changed
No one is saying it is an easy call. Spa is a notoriously dangerous circuit, with an extremely dangerous section between T1 (La Source) and T7 (Les Combes). The drivers go through a compression at Eau Rouge and then up a steep incline on the other side, exiting onto a blind crest onto the Kemmel Straight. Although changes were made following Hubert's death, and there is now more run-off on the left-hand side of Eau Rouge and Raidillon in particular, with the barriers moved back quite significantly, it is still possible for cars to go off, hit the barrier and bounce back onto the racing line.
George Russell was probably in the majority of drivers who felt race control got it right. The Mercedes driver, who is a director of the Grand Prix Drivers Association, said it would have been 'stupidity' to begin the race any earlier.
'As a racer, you always want to get going, you love driving in the rain, but the fact is, when you're doing over 200 miles an hour out of Eau Rouge, you literally can't see anything,' Russell said. 'You may as well have a blindfold on. It isn't racing, it's just stupidity.
'So I think, considering it was clearly going to be dry from four o'clock onwards, I think they made the right call.'
But an element of danger and risk is also part and parcel of Formula One. Fans were denied what could have been an exciting race on Sunday. If the Spa circuit needs further modifications to make it safer, fine, but they surely ought to be able to race in the wet. Ex-driver Karun Chandhok spoke for millions when he posted on social media a few minutes before the restart: 'Have we just given up on having wet races anymore? They're going to be on slicks in a few minutes!' He was absolutely right.
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Times
3 hours ago
- Times
Max Verstappen slams 80-minute rain delay – but George Russell backs FIA
George Russell said it 'isn't racing, it's just stupidity' to suggest the FIA was wrong to delay the Belgium Grand Prix due to rain. The Spa-Francorchamps circuit is one of the most dangerous on the calendar, but Max Verstappen said the race was 'ruined' after an 80-minute rain delay without cars on track, and a further ten behind the safety car. McLaren secured a one-two in the grand prix which began on a wet track but was predominantly dry. Oscar Piastri overtook Lando Norris on the first racing lap — with the leader disadvantaged without a slipstream. The move effectively won Piastri the race. While the cars lined up on the grid, teams were erecting gazebos as a sudden shower hit the track. Drivers reported poor visibility on the formation lap behind the safety car, so the start was delayed. It is the spray from the cars which is the main issue, rather than the standing water or grip itself from the intermediate or wet tyres. 'As a racer, you always want to get going,' said Mercedes driver Russell, who finished fifth. 'You love driving in the rain. But the fact is, when you're doing over 200 miles an hour out of Eau Rouge, you literally cannot see anything, you may as well have a blindfold on. It isn't racing, it's just stupidity.' Anthoine Hubert, the F2 driver, died aged 22 in a crash at this circuit in 2019, while Dilano van 't Hoff died in a multi-car crash in the rain in a Freca race here in 2023. Frustration remains at the length of the delays when rain occurs in Formula 1 races, and the idea of wet tyres essentially being made redundant because of the spray. There is hope that next year's new regulations could mean slightly less spray is produced from the back of the cars. It was not an afternoon which produced great interest for the television fan, or those who had braved the weather in Belgium. Drivers spent an hour and 20 minutes twiddling their thumbs in the garage, as a heavier rain shower on the radar prevented the FIA starting the race in a brief dry period. Eventually it stopped by 4.20pm local time with the race resuming behind the safety car. 'Yeah [it could have started] miles earlier, I mean one hour earlier,' Verstappen said. 'It was a bit of a shame, they [the FIA] took a more cautious approach. Of course, we spoke about it after Silverstone to be a little more cautious because there was quite a lot of water there, but this for me it was the other extreme. It just ruined a nice classic wet race as well.' Verstappen and Red Bull had added downforce to his car ahead of qualifying, predicting wet weather conditions. He likely would have had more grip than his rivals if the race had got underway in the rain. Instead, the new normal for Red Bull without Christian Horner, their long-serving former team principal and CEO, was rather similar to the old one; Verstappen did not have the pace to challenge the McLarens and was stuck behind the Ferrari of Charles Leclerc in third, with Verstappen eventually finishing fourth. The most notable difference was perhaps on the grid, with Verstappen's father Jos — who had been openly critical of Horner — relaxed and stood alongside new team principal Laurent Mekies. It was the first grand prix in 405 events (and Red Bull's entire race history) that Horner had not attended. On lap five, racing began in earnest with a rolling start after Norris, on pole, was one of those to report on the radio that one side of the grid was drier than the other, suggesting a standing start would not be fair. It did him little favour though — as having used much of his battery pack on the restart, he was easily passed by his team-mate Piastri on the Kemmel Straight. 'A bit lively up over the hill,' was the calm Australian's verdict. Piastri extended his championship lead to 16 points so won't mind the lack of activity, barely even given a fright by his team-mate, on the harder compound tyre, who again made mistakes running wide in his eagerness to close the gap. Norris was perhaps always going to struggle, with Piastri joking after qualifying that it might have been to his advantage that he could not beat the Briton on Saturday given the benefit of the slipstream. In the wet conditions it is impossible to drive through Eau Rouge flat out, but Norris admitted his team-mate had 'committed a bit more', holding his nerve to take the lead. That forced Norris to opt for an alternative strategy, selecting the hard compound in the hope he would be able to reach the chequered flag, while Piastri could struggle on the medium. Instead, the championship leader calmly managed his tyres, while Norris again made mistakes as he pushed to the limit to close the gap. The battle promised much but fizzled out in the closing laps as it became clear Piastri had too much of an advantage. 'I got a good exit out of turn 1 and then lifted as little as I dared through Eau Rouge and it worked out pretty well. We had it mostly under control after that,' Piastri said. It was a role reversal on his fortunes in the sprint race earlier in the weekend, where he was the pole sitter and was passed by Verstappen on the Kemmel Straight. Lewis Hamilton produced an excellent recovery drive to finish seventh, having started in 18th. He perfectly timed the crucial decision to switch from intermediate tyres to slicks on lap 11 but still apologised to his team on the radio for mistakes earlier in the weekend. Hamilton had very little to lose after what he described as a 'weekend to forget', having spun his car in sprint qualifying, finishing 15th in that short-format race, and then been eliminated from the first session of main qualifying after exceeding track limits at Raidillon. He called it an 'unacceptable' individual error.
BBC News
3 hours ago
- BBC News
Fine margins: How Norris lost out to Piastri in Belgium
Oscar Piastri's victory in the Belgian Grand Prix underlined the fine margins that will likely decide the world championship battle with his team-mate Lando Australian bounced back after two consecutive victories for Norris on a weekend on which the advantage swung back and forth between the McLaren drivers almost from session to pair arrived at Spa-Francorchamps on the back of two consecutive wins for Norris, one from the front in Austria, one somewhat fortuitous after a penalty for Piastri at took a pole position each in Belgium - one for Piastri for the sprint, and one for Norris for the grand prix. And the race turned on a few key drive was from the top drawer - he took the lead from Norris at the rolling start after a few exploratory laps behind the safety car in the wet by being, by Norris' admission, a little braver through Eau Rouge on the first he managed his position with careful judgement to make his medium-compound tyres last to the end while under pressure from the closing Norris on more durable Norris may look back on a few small errors in which he could have done better. He said he "couldn't have won". He probably could not. But he could have given himself a slither of a chance, despite the difficult position he was in by leading at the start. The start Piastri had demonstrated how difficult it is for the driver on pole to lead by the end of the first lap at Spa by losing the sprint race win to Red Bull's Max Dutchman slipstreamed past Piastri up the hill to Les Combes, and then held the McLaren at bay for 15 laps, while Norris followed closely in the grand prix, it was Norris in front, with Piastri in second and Piastri had been thinking about the opportunity this presented him since losing out on pole the day team boss Andrea Stella said: "This weekend, Oscar, if anything, the only inaccuracy was in qualifying, where his laps weren't perfect."At the same time, we have to say that after the sprint qualifying, he said, 'Yeah, I'm in pole position, but maybe this is not the right place to be in pole position.'"And as a joke, after the qualifying yesterday, he said, 'That was not my best lap in Q3, but perhaps this is the best place not to have the best lap in Q3.'"Sure enough, Piastri took the lead on lap one of the grand prix, just as Verstappen had the day before."I had a good run out of Turn One," he said, "and then tried to be as brave as I could through Eau Rouge and was able to stay pretty close. After that, the slipstream did the rest for me."When I watched the onboard back, it didn't look quite as scary as it felt in the car. I knew that I had to be very committed to pull that off."But Norris could have done a better job. For a start, he failed to build himself a gap over the finish line by arguably going too early at the restart. Then he made a mistake at La Source, which allowed Piastri to be right on his tail approaching Eau Rouge."I didn't have the best Turn One," Norris said. "So it's hard to know how much that played a part. At the same time, Oscar came past me pretty easily. So even if I had a better Turn One, his run and the slipstream probably still would have got me."Stella said: "It would have always been very difficult for Lando to keep the position starting first at the safety car restart. At the same time, I think Lando didn't help himself by not having a great gap on the finish line." The pit stops The next turning point was the stops. Piastri had first choice as leader, and went for mediums with a stop on lap could have pitted Norris at the same time - the so-called double-stack - but went for another lap, and decided for hard tyres, to go to the end. Piastri was planning the same but didn't know whether the mediums would make had been just under two seconds behind when Piastri pitted, and was nine seconds back when he rejoined the seconds of that offset can be accounted for by a slower pit stop, the other five by the extra lap on worn intermediates. A double-stack would have cost less time - but then he'd have been on the mediums, and the race effectively already said: "To catch Oscar from that gap is quite an achievement. I gave it a good shot, but just not close enough."Piastri said: "It was quite a late decision to pit on the lap we did, but there's risks either way. If I was in Lando's position, I probably would have done the same thing. At that point, it seemed like the safest thing to do was go on the medium, because the hard is two steps harder here."Stella said: "We did consider double stacking. At the same time, it was possible for Lando to deviate. He opted to deviate, which would have given him the possibility to go on hard tyres, which is what he decided to do."Actually, I thought at some stage that that would have been a very good move, but I have to say that Oscar managed a very solid and strong stint on the medium tyres. Even if Lando was, on average, a little bit faster, that was not enough to attack Oscar at the end." The chase Norris now had to try to chase Piastri down. He got to within 3.4 seconds by the end of the race, but he probably lost a little more than that with three errors during his ran wide at the fast Pouhon double left-hander on lap 26, costing himself 1.3 seconds, then had lock-ups at La Source on laps 33 and 43, costing a total of just under three a perfect race might have given him a shot at Piastri on the last lap or two. But given how difficult overtaking proved at Spa in both races, the chances of him actually getting by must be considered slim in the said: "Yes, Lando had a couple of lock-ups in corner one and also a little oversteer in corner nine that cost him time. I think this, overall, prevented us from having an interesting battle, possibly, at the end."But, in fairness, even Oscar had a couple of times in corner one a little bit of a time loss."It's very difficult when you push so much in these conditions. It's very difficult to always drive within the limit of the grip, and also it's not easy to always keep the car on the racing line when you have the maximum grip, considering that, away from that, you can lose it very rapidly because of the track being still a little damp." The lessons Piastri's sixth win in 13 races extends his lead in the see-sawing battle to 15 points before the next race in Hungary this weekend, scene last year of Piastri's maiden victory, in somewhat controversial circumstances. Stella called Piastri's drive "very, very, very high quality", but added: "We have two drivers which to the standards that even myself in my career have been close to, driving with multiple World Champions, I think Lando and Oscar are operating at that level, at the level of deservedly being in contention for the drivers' world championship."This is quite the compliment considering Stella engineered both Michael Schumacher and Fernando Alonso during his Ferrari years earlier this said: "The difference will be made by the accuracy, the precision, the quality of the execution."The execution is what is going to make the main difference. We, as a team, we will try and make sure that from a reliability point of view, from a team operation point of view, we are as good as possible, such that it will be the drivers deciding their own outcome in terms of competing for the drivers' championship." Should the race have started earlier? The other main talking point at Spa was whether the race should have started earlier - either at the original start time, or a few minutes before it eventually Hamilton and Max Verstappen were of the view that it should have and that officials had been too said the decision "didn't make sense". He said that at the scheduled start time "it was not even raining" and added: "Of course between Turn One and five there was quite a bit of water, but two or three laps behind the safety car it would have been a lot more clear. And the rest of the track was anyway ready to go. It's a bit of a shame."Hamilton added: "I kept shouting, like, it's ready to go, it's ready to go. And they kept going around and around and around."However, both acknowledged that the decisions were made after the drivers had urged officials following the last race at Silverstone - in which one car rammed another unsighted at a restart in the rain - not to go too Piastri and Ferrari's Charles Leclerc both pointed out the extreme dangers of Spa, and referenced the two fatalities that have happened there in junior categories in recent said: "For that reason, I'd rather be safe than too early. It's a constant discussion, and we'll probably feed the people that made this decision back that maybe it was a little bit on the late side, but I wouldn't have changed anything."Piastri added: "The past few years, particularly here, we've given the FIA feedback that we would much rather be on the safe side than risk anything. I think that's what we did today."If you were to be picky, maybe we could have done one less formation lap. But in the grand scheme of things, if that's one lap too early, is it worth it? No."
The Guardian
5 hours ago
- The Guardian
Max Verstappen condemns delayed Belgian Grand Prix start amid wet weather
Max Verstappen condemned as unnecessary the FIA decision to delay the start of the Belgian Grand Prix because of adverse weather conditions, but his view was countered by George Russell, a director of the Grand Prix Drivers' Association, who insisted any other call from the governing body would have been 'stupidity' given the conditions and the dangerous nature of the Spa‑Francorchamps circuit. The start was delayed by an hour and 20 minutes after rain swept into Spa just before the race. The FIA opted not to proceed after one formation lap because the visibility given the spray from the cars was so poor. The circuit is enormously fast and challenging and can be dangerous even in good conditions. There have been two fatalities in recent years, Anthoine Hubert in 2019 and Dilano van 't Hoff in 2023. Verstappen, whose Red Bull car had been readied to make the most of a wet race, was insistent that the drivers could have coped and that as they began racing they would have been able to clear the standing water. When asked when he believed the race should have begun, he said: 'Three o'clock, straight away. It was not even raining. Between turn one and five there was quite a bit of water but if you do two or three laps behind the safety car, then it would have been a lot more clear, and the rest of the track was ready to go.' The Dutchman, who finished fourth in the race won by McLaren's Oscar Piastri, concluded with a swipe at the FIA. 'Of course at the end of the day they do what they want, right? I mean, they decide. I just find it is a bit of a shame for everyone, you will never see these classic kind of wet races any more.' Russell, however, was among other drivers – including Piastri and Ferrari's Charles Leclerc – who felt the decision had been correct. 'As a racer, you always want to get going, you love driving in the rain,' he said. 'But the fact is, when you're doing over 200 miles an hour out of Eau Rouge, you literally cannot see anything, you may as well have a blindfold on. [That] isn't racing; it's just stupidity. Considering it was clearly going to be dry from 4pm onwards, they made the right call.' Sign up to The Recap The best of our sports journalism from the past seven days and a heads-up on the weekend's action after newsletter promotion Verstappen's view, though, was echoed by Lewis Hamilton, who started 18th but finished seventh after he called the moment to change over to slick tyres perfectly, given the track had dried very quickly. 'I would agree [with Verstappen],' he said. 'My car was set up for that [wet conditions], and they waited for it to dry. Especially at the end, it was a dry line with hardly any spray.'
