Max Verstappen holds off charging Charles Leclerc to claim Miami Grand Prix glory for Red Bull

Max Verstappen held off a late charge from Charles Leclerc to take glory at the inaugural Miami Grand Prix for Red Bull. At the green light, Verstappen pounced on a mediocre start from Carlos Sainz in second, and swept past him to sit in behind Leclerc in pole.

Ad/> Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton dropped down into seventh from fifth from the off, and he complained to his team that Alpine’s experienced Fernando Alonso had clipped his car and done damage, with replays revealing the two had rubbed tyres briefly. «It definitely feels like there's some damage,” the seven-time champion complained.

Miami Grand PrixWolff explains FP3 experiments harmed car: 'We worsened it'4 HOURS AGO After just five laps, Verstappen had whittled the lead down to 1.4 seconds and the spectre of DRS was looming, and on lap 8 his team informed him that the Monegasque’s right front tyre was starting to show damage. That was all the encouragement the Dutchman needed and on lap 9 he flicked the DRS switch, moved in for the slipstream, and leapt into the lead on turn 1 after the finish line straight.

There was a brief scare for Red Bull — beset by early season reliability problems — as on lap 20 Sergio Perez exclaimed, ‘I’m losing a lot of power!’ It seemed he was losing around four seconds a lap, but his team quickly put things right to avoid disaster. With 16 laps remaining there was drama as Pierre Gasly was caught unaware and clattered into the quicker Lando Norris, who spun out with a burst tyre, meaning the virtual safety came out, allowing Russell to take new tyres without sacrificing a place.