Red Bull explains why it had upper hand over Ferrari at Imola

Max Verstappen scored his second victory of the 2022 season by controlling proceedings in the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, leading home Red Bull team-mate Sergio Perez.

It marked Red Bull’s first 1-2 finish since the 2016 Malaysian Grand Prix as it capitalised on a difficult race for Ferrari on home turf.

Carlos Sainz retired on the opening lap after contact with Daniel Ricciardo, while Charles Leclerc spun off the track while chasing Perez for second place in the closing stages. Leclerc ultimately recovered to finish sixth.

Red Bull scored 58 out of a possible 59 points over the sprint race weekend as it enjoyed an edge over Ferrari for outright pace, which Horner put down to how the RB18 car worked with the tyres.

“As we saw in Melbourne, the tyres, there's an operating window, and with the setup this weekend, we got it right,” Horner explained.

“We could see that Charles was struggling a little bit more with the front tyres here than we were, both in yesterday's race and it was starting to happen in the latter part of today's race.

“So that just gave us the the upper hand, and I think Max was able to manage the race perfectly.

“Checo was able to build a gap to Charles and manage that gap. And at no point other than one trip across the grass with Checo did we really come under too much pressure.”

Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB18, Sergio Perez, Red Bull Racing RB18, Lando Norris, McLaren MCL36, Charles Leclerc, Ferrari F1-75, the rest of the field

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

Verstappen scored pole position in Friday’s qualifying session, but was able to recover from losing the lead of the sprint race to Leclerc off the line to overtake the Ferrari in the closing stages of the Saturday event.

Ferrari