Oscar Piastri takes a massive gain in the world championship as he wins the Dutch Grand Prix while Norris fails to finish the race.
Lando Norris appeared to get a letter launch off the line than Piastri, but the soft tyres on Max Verstappen helped him to but Norris ahead under some pressure, ultimately taking second place from him on the first lap after sweeping around the outside of turn 3.
The opening lap also proved to be productive for Alex Albon, who managed to gain four positions to put his Williams into the points paying positions.
Norris would begin to quickly lose time behind Verstappen, whose soft tyres appeared to quickly wear. It would take until lap 9 for him to get the job done, making a nice move around the outside of turn 1, but he was now over four seconds behind Piastri.
Rain was being reported to fall in the opening portion of the race, but with forecasts predicting it to be light, it meant that the strategy was difficult to guess, with Aston Martin opting to put stroll onto the hard tyres on lap 10, before any rain had fallen.
The rain had appeared to begin to fall at around lap 15, after Piastri was shown to have reported drops on his visor, but the initial strength did not appear to have any real impact on pace.
The rain had appeared to become a bit more frequent around lap 20, however the likes of Alonso, Tsunoda and Hulkenberg did not appear to believe that it would get to a strength needed for intermediate tyres, pitting onto hards instead.
A safety car would be brought out on lap 23 after Lewis Hamilton would crash at turn 3, appearing to get some oversteer before then running wide into the barriers, potentially impacted by running over some slippier paint.
This would have a negative effect on his teammate Leclerc, who had just pit to try and undercut for fourth place, but would ultimately filter out into sixth, with Hadjar and Russell able to get free pit stops.
The restart appeared to see contact between Sainz and Lawson, both of whole tumbled down the order and would each have to come in as a result, with each having to come into the pits as a result. Sainz would receive a 10 second penalty for the incident.
Verstappen looked feisty behind Norris in the opening lap after the restart after going onto mediums tyres, however the threat quickly fizzled out after that.
A virtual safety car came out on lap 31 for a rather innocuous reason, as a piece of carbon fibre from a Williams car was left stranded on the start-finish straight.
Leclerc was able to get an amazing restart after the virtual safety car ended, and would make a move around the outside of Russell at turn 11, but did not appear to have the space into turn 12, though Leclerc would force his way through on Russell to take fifth, though it would appear that all four wheels were over the white line, suggesting he went off track.
As the race entered something of a processional period, a DRS train began to emerge which would impact everyone from 10th down to 17th, highlighting the difficulty in trying to pass at this circuit.
Struggling to overtake Leclerc, Mercedes would pull the trigger on a gamble on lap 52 to pit Antonelli onto a set of soft tyres to try and use either an undercut or tyre offset to eventually pass the Ferrari, depending on what Leclerc did.
What Leclerc did do was pit in response, and Antonelli’s undercut looked as though it could work at first when he dived into turn 3 after Leclerc came out of the pits.
However, his car would be pushed up the track given the banking at that turn, alongside there being possibly too much speed being carried into the corner, causing the two to make contact, spinning Leclerc round and taking him out of the race.
An interesting tyre call was made during the ensuing pit stops, with both McLarens potentially being under pressure after opting for hard tyres, while the dice drivers behind them all decided to go for softs.
It appeared to be something of a repeat of the first safety car restart though, where Piastri would pull out a strong gap, Verstappen would look quick but ultimately nothing would change.
Norris did appear to keep up with his teammate better this time though, managing to get within DRS range for the first time all race on as the cars entered lap 60, though this gap would open back up again one lap later.
A third safety car would come out with some major championship implications, as Lando Norris would suffer from a mechanical issue and would be forced to retire from the race, gifting Piastri a massive points gain.
Piastri would manage the restart well once again, pulling a nice gap from Verstappen behind, and with no drama until the end, he would end the race as the victor.
The victory, along with Norris’ DNF, would extend Piastri’s lead in the world championship to 34 points, a significant margin with just nine races to go.
Norris’ loss was also Hadjar’s gain, as the French rookie would be promoted into third place, his first career podium in Formula 1.
The next race will take place in just one week, where F1 will return to Italy to race at Monza.
