Bottas wins sprint in Brazil for Verstappen and takes first place, Hamilton shows resilience after being eliminated | Cars and motorsports

Verstappen will start the São Paulo Grand Prix, as the race is officially called this year, from second place on Sunday. He started the night at the front of the sprint qualifier, due to a penalty from Lewis Hamilton, but immediately saw Valtteri Bottas come along at the start and was unable to get the Finn back. Carlos Sainz (Ferrari) was also briefly ahead of Verstappen, but eventually finished third.

Lewis Hamilton cut off the field very easily from the last starting point. In a short time he was fourteen. Daniel Ricciardo was a tough customer for a while, but then the champion quickly moved up to fifth. He even finished far behind Sergio Perez, who couldn’t break any bets. In the constructors’ battle, Mercedes was one point ahead of Red Bull, and the gap is now two points.

The sprint race was the last part of a crazy Saturday. Early in the morning Verstappen had to report to the hosts about touching Hamilton’s car, Friday after qualifying. He was fined 50,000 euros. Then Mercedes sat inside for an hour to explain the rear wing. The team was unable to impress the hosts as Hamilton was removed from the qualifying score. His pavilion was wide open during the DRS. The FIA ​​indicated that it did not see any malicious intent in this, but it also did not find mitigating circumstances to waive the penalty. That’s why Hamilton had to start the sprint from behind. He will also be put back five places on Sunday to replace his combustion engine, so he will start from 10th. “It’s not over yet,” he said over the onboard radio.

If Verstappen scores four more points than Hamilton tomorrow, and thus gets at least 26 after the race, he will reach “match point” and could already become world champion next week in Qatar.