Celebrations have been going crazy since Lando Norris snatched his first win in Formula 1 on May 5, 2024, at the Miami International Autodrome. A victory that the whole community has been waiting for since he joined the grid in 2019.
The race started with Max Verstappen leading the pack, as usual. Suddenly, he hits a cone during lap 23, at turn 15, and we see the Virtual Safety Car being deployed. Now you might have told yourself that this is a typical scenario where Max will still lead with a 20+ gap. Well not this time.
Because Piastri leads the race when Verstappen enters the pitlane. Then, Piastri and Sainz enter the pitlane, which resulted in Lando leading the race. And for the first time, he led the race all the way to the checkered flag. It was absolutely magnificent.
Later on, we see an incident between Kevin Magnussen (who was a magnet for penalties this weekend) and Logan Sargeant causing the entry of the safety car. I have to admit, at that moment I told myself, “This is it. Max is going to take the lead once the safety car is out”.
But by some means, the safety car makes a mistake and enters in front of Max Verstappen instead of Lando Norris, which stunned the spectators. A mistake, in Norris’ favor that gave him the opportunity to widen the gap between him and Verstappen. Can you believe that?
Whether the safety car miscalculated the distance thinking it would enter in front of Norris or it entered in front of Verstappen as a force of habit, we don’t know. But a mistake is unfortunately a mistake.
However, Norris was performing like a star that day, truly believing he would have won anyway, with or without the safety car.
Everyone was happy, other drivers, team principles, fans of other drivers, we were all happy for him because he deserved that win.
The race finished with Lando in P1, Max Verstappen in P2, and Charles Leclerc in P3. A podium worth watching.
But another notable highlight worth mentioning was the battle between Carlos Sainz and Oscar Piastri, or should I say, the ‘beef’ between them. These two have been beefing together for a while now and in more than one race.
So, it goes like this: Sainz overtakes Piastri, Piastri overtakes Sainz, Sainz overtakes Piastri, Piastri overtakes Sainz, Sainz overtakes Piastri. Feeling dizzy yet? Let me explain.
Sainz overtakes Piastri in lap 34. At the same moment, Piastri reclaims his position pushing Sainz off the track, causing him to complain that Oscar must give him the position back or he will get a penalty. Honestly, it felt like Sainz was panicking inside his car.
On lap 40, Sainz overtakes Piastri again causing a collision, right afterward Piastri overtakes him.
The collision caused a problem in Oscar’s car that made an opening for Carlos to overtake him and reclaim P4.
Someone said, when Carlos realized that Lando would win the race, he pushed quite hard trying to be on the podium with him. Whether that assumption was correct or not, Carlos couldn’t be on the podium with Lando. And he got a penalty after the race for causing the collision, dropping him to P5 while Piastri finished in P13.
Overall, we must admit that the race was more exciting than we might have anticipated, and I really hope that Emilia Romagna will be as exciting. Because if it is, you will find me gossiping about it the next day. And if it’s not, you will find me gossiping as well. Because I love gossiping and you are not getting rid of me.
Till we meet again…