Starting 6th in the Mercedes, no one expected Russel to be in contention for the win. But the British driver made a tricky 1 stop strategy work to win his 3rd race in Formula 1 .

Finlay McSporran
Published: 19:29, 28th July 2024

However, whilst writing this it was announced that he’s been disqualified from the race, handing the win to his teammate Lewis Hamilton! This article details how the race was won and lost.

Race Report

Pole-sitter Leclerc held the lead into turn one, as Perez lost out to Hamilton in the battle for second while his teammate Verstappen had a good start from 11th and had already made his way up into P8 as they started the second lap. The two McLaren’s went side-by-side round turn 1 with Norris dipping a wheel in the gravel and dropping down a handful of places.

The race pace of the Mercedes was proving too much for Leclerc, as Hamilton used DRS to blast past him and into the lead on lap 3.

The race leaders would start to come in on lap 11 as Russel and Verstappen came in for the fresh rubber with race leader Hamilton coming in a lap later, along with Perez and Piastry. Leclerc and Norris would pit a few laps later whilst Sainz stayed out on the hard tyres, with the top 8 being Sainz, Hamilton, Leclerc, Piastry, Perez, Russel, Verstappen and Norris on lap 16.

Race leader Sainz was trying the one-stop, but was clearly struggling as he went wide at Stavelot, with his engineer telling him “plan B” as he came in on lap 21. Another driver struggling was Sergio Perez, the Mexican’s medium tyres fading as Russel on the hards got passed him for P4, with Perez coming in at the end of the lap to let Verstappen through.

Leclerc would come in on lap 26 to kick off the second round of pit stops. Hamilton would come in a lap later, maintaining the lead as he emerged back out on track.

Piastry came in a few laps later, although he overshoot the box, almost running over the front jack man costing him valuable time in the pits.

As the rest of the leaders came in to pit George Russel stayed out on the hard compound tyres he put on lap 11, leaving him in the race lead.

After the second set of pit stops Verstappen was in 5th with Norris in DRS range however the McLaren driver couldn’t get close enough to launch an attack.

Up ahead and the other McLaren of Oscar Piastry was making up for his slow stop as he passed Leclerc for a spot on the podium on lap 36.

With 8 laps left the gap between Hamilton and Russel was 4 seconds, with Piastry 5 seconds behind Hamilton and catching him by almost a second a lap.

A few laps later and Hamilton was now within DRS range of his teammate, but couldn’t find a way passed despite having a tyre advantage. Surprisingly, Russel still had enough grip from his 30 lap old tyres to stay ahead of Hamilton. But with Piastry now on the scene, could Russel hold on against the odds and take a brilliant victory?

The answer was yes, at the time anyway, as it’s just been confirmed that George Russel is disqualified from the Belgian Grand Prix as his car was found to be under the minimum weight following post race inspections.

That hands the win to Lewis Hamilton, who lead most of the race but was unable to pass his teammate at the end.

Elsewhere on the grid, Charles Leclerc is promoted to P3 as a result of Russel’s DSQ, with Daniel Ricardo promoted to 10th place, a well needed points scoring for the man chasing Perez’s Redbull seat.

Speaking off Perez, he finished 7th with the fastest lap, in what may very well be his final F1 race as Redbull consider their driver options as we head into the summer break.

But the big loser today was definitely George Russel, who had what was without a doubt his most impressive race win taken away from him through no fault of his own. This also cost Mercedes what would have been their first 1-2 since Sao Paulo 2022, with team boss Toto Wolf saying “We have to learn from that. As a team there are more positives to take, obviously for George it’s a massive blow.”

Full Race Results

#	DRIVER	TEAM	TIME
1	Lewis HAMILTON	Mercedes
2	Oscar PIASTRI	McLaren	+ 0.647
3	Charles LECLERC	Ferrari	+ 8.023
4	Max VERSTAPPEN	Red Bull	+ 8.700
5	Lando NORRIS	McLaren	+ 9.324
6	Carlos SAINZ	Ferrari	+ 19.269
7	Sergio PÉREZ	Red Bull	+ 42.669
8	Fernando ALONSO	Aston Martin	+ 49.437
9	Esteban OCON	Alpine	+ 52.026
10	Daniel RICCIARDO	VCARB	+ 54.400
11	Lance STROLL	Aston Martin	+ 62.485
12	Alexander ALBON	Williams	+ 63.125
13	Pierre GASLY	Alpine	+ 63.839
14	Kevin MAGNUSSEN	Haas	+ 66.105
15	Valtteri BOTTAS	Stake	+ 70.112
16	Yuki TSUNODA	VCARB	+ 76.211
17	Logan SARGEANT	Williams	+ 85.531
18	Nico HULKENBERG	Haas	+ 88.307
19	Guanyu ZHOU	Stake	DNF
20	George RUSSELL	Mercedes	DSQ

After another eventful race F1 now heads into the summer break, giving the teams and drivers a well needed rest before the sport returns on the 25th of August for the Dutch Grand Prix, with the big question being can Redbull hold on to their title lead?

Tags:

Formula 1

Belgian GP