Oscar Piastri wins Belgian Grand Prix to extend championship lead
Ferrari's Charles Leclerc came third as Piastri stretched his lead in the drivers' standings over Norris to 16 points.
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Heavy rain delayed the 13th round of the season by 80 minutes, with organisers eventually allowing a rolling start after four laps behind the safety car as the sun finally appeared.
Pole sitter Norris was quickly passed by Piastri as Norris complained he had a problem with his car's battery.
Piastri then produced a controlled race from the front to lead home McLaren's sixth 1-2 of the season.
'I knew lap one was going to be my best chance of winning the race,' said Piastri.
'Rest of race we managed really well,' the Australian added.
'Oscar did a good job, nothing more to say,' said Norris.
Max Verstappen, winner of Saturday's sprint, took fourth in Laurent Mekies' first race weekend as Red Bull team principal after the sacking of Christian Horner a fortnight ago.
– © AFP 2025
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Irish Times
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Oscar Piastri eases away from Lando Norris to win rain-hit Belgian Grand Prix
Oscar Piastri won the Belgian Grand Prix with a dominant drive at Spa for McLaren, comfortably beating his team-mate Lando Norris into second and Ferrari's Charles Leclerc into third. Max Verstappen was fourth for Red Bull in the team's first race without their recently dismissed team principal Christin Horner, while Lewis Hamilton made the most of the changeable, wet-dry conditions to move from 18th on the grid to finish seventh. After a delayed start of almost an hour and a half due to heavy rain in the Ardennes mountains, when racing finally began in earnest Piastri pounced to take the lead from Norris with an opportunistic and decisive move into Les Combes. Having hit the front he was absolutely relentless in grinding out a victory and even a counter-tyre strategy from Norris could not bring him quite back into contention. The victory was another combative statement of intent from Piastri, demonstrating that even when he is on the back foot he retains a steely determination. He was outpaced in qualifying by Norris, but once he had retaken the lead from second on the grid he was in assured control from the front, with the same measured, calm confidence that is almost disarming as it becomes ominously clear to his rivals that the 24-year-old Australian has all the traits of a world champion in waiting. Piastri was untouchable to take his sixth win from 13 races this season. No other driver has come close to matching his consistency and a season that began in Australia with a win for Norris has since been bossed by Piastri, who has laid down another marker that it will be remarkably hard to pass him this season. He leads Norris by 16 points with 11 meetings to go in a fight increasingly looking like it will go down to the wire. READ MORE With rain having swept across the circuit on and off all day, another deluge began just before the start and the race was delayed after one formation lap because of the poor visibility caused by the spray. The cars returned to the pit lane for over an hour as the rain eased. At 4.20pm the race officially began with the field circulating behind the safety car for the opening four laps, before they were finally let off the leash in a rolling start. Norris led them away and just held his lead from Piastri but the Australian was charging, right on his tail through Eau Rouge and, enjoying a slipstream on the Kemmel straight, he took the lead into Les Combes. It was the decisive moment as Leclerc and Verstappen followed them through in third and fourth. Lewis Hamilton's Ferrari (left) battles for track position with Liam Lawson of Racing Bulls during the Belgian Grand Prix. Photograph:Hamilton, who had taken a new power unit and was thus starting from the pit lane, was able to set his car up for the wet conditions and moved swiftly up to 13th by lap 10, with a series of decisive passes, including three cars in one lap. He then took a chance on an early stop for slick tyres as the track dried on lap 12, the first driver to do so and he emerged in 17th but his instincts were spot on. Piastri duly followed him into the pits a lap later as did Verstappen and Leclerc, all for the medium rubber, while Norris had to stay out for the extra lap and he opted to take the hard tyre in an effort to make it to the end without another stop. It was the slower compound but more durable. Hamilton had made great gains with his early stop and the quick laps that immediately followed on slicks and as the stops played out he had moved up to seventh. McLaren informed Norris that Piastri too was going to try to reach the flag on the medium tyres but would have to ease his pace to do so. Piastri maintained an eight-second lead as the race settled into what was very much a procession as the laps came down, the only real jeopardy over whether the medium rubber would make the finish. Piastri duly eased his tyres on, however, and was comfortable as he approached the end. Norris did close the gap down to five seconds and he pushed hard but a couple of minor errors at La Source and Pouhon cost him and the Australian remained in control to the flag for another consummate win. George Russell was fifth for Mercedes, Alex Albon sixth for Williams, Liam Lawson eighth for Racing Bulls, Gabriel Bortoleto ninth for Sauber and Pierre Gasly 10th for Alpine. – Guardian
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Oscar Piastri wins Belgian Grand Prix to extend championship lead
OSCAR PIASTRI HELD held off his McLaren teammate Lando Norris to win the Belgian Grand Prix today. Ferrari's Charles Leclerc came third as Piastri stretched his lead in the drivers' standings over Norris to 16 points. Advertisement Heavy rain delayed the 13th round of the season by 80 minutes, with organisers eventually allowing a rolling start after four laps behind the safety car as the sun finally appeared. Pole sitter Norris was quickly passed by Piastri as Norris complained he had a problem with his car's battery. Piastri then produced a controlled race from the front to lead home McLaren's sixth 1-2 of the season. 'I knew lap one was going to be my best chance of winning the race,' said Piastri. 'Rest of race we managed really well,' the Australian added. 'Oscar did a good job, nothing more to say,' said Norris. Max Verstappen, winner of Saturday's sprint, took fourth in Laurent Mekies' first race weekend as Red Bull team principal after the sacking of Christian Horner a fortnight ago. – © AFP 2025
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5 hours ago
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Hamilton agrees with Verstappen that Belgian GP should not have been delayed
Lewis Hamilton said he agreed with Max Verstappen that the start of the Belgian Grand Prix should not have been suspended. Verstappen branded race director Rui Marques' move to bring out the red flag after a single formation lap in the rain at Spa-Francorchamps as 'silly' and 'way too cautious'. Following a delay of one hour and 20 minutes – which the FIA said was due to 'poor visibility' – the race eventually got under way, albeit in a rolling start after four laps behind the safety car. Hamilton was able to switch from intermediates to dry tyres after just seven racing laps. The Belgian Grand Prix started after four laps behind the safety car and a delay of one hour and 20 minutes (Bradley Collyer/PA) And when it was put to Hamilton, who made up 11 places to finish seventh, that Verstappen claimed the race should have started immediately, he replied: 'I would agree. My car was set up for that, and they waited for it to dry. Especially at the end. It was a dry line with hardly any spray.' There have been 49 driver/rider fatalities at Spa-Francorchamps in the last 100 years – most recently Dutch 18-year-old Dilano Van 't Hoff in 2023, and Frenchman Anthonie Hubert in a Formula Two race four years previously. The last Formula One race at Silverstone also took place in wet conditions, and Hamilton, 40, continued: 'It was just a reaction to Silverstone. 'We sat down and spoke about it after Silverstone. Lots of drivers in the last race said we shouldn't have restarted, because of a lack of visibility. And as soon as someone up ahead said, 'visibility is pretty bad' which, it wasn't great but it wasn't as bad as the last race, they just decided to wait. 'They still did a good job. Of course we did miss some of the extreme wet weather racing, which would have been nice. But for some reason the spray here is like a fog.' 🔴 RED FLAG 🔴 It's very wet out there and visibility is poor. The drivers will head back to the pit lane to wait for conditions to improve #F1 #BelgianGP — Formula 1 (@F1) July 27, 2025 In 2021, the rain-hit race was abandoned after just two laps behind the safety car. Defending the decision to delay the start of Sunday's event, Hamilton's Ferrari team-mate Charles Leclerc said: 'On a track like this you cannot forget about the history and what has happened in the past so I would rather be safe than go early.' Oscar Piastri, who won in Belgium to extend his championship lead over Lando Norris to 16 points, continued: 'We have given the FIA feedback that we would much rather be on the safe side. 'If you were being picky you might say we could have done one fewer lap behind the safety car but is the risk worth it? 'The first time we tried to start the race, with only Lando ahead, I couldn't see a thing, so you can imagine what it is like for the guys at the back.'
