George Russell handed Mercedes their third Formula 1 win in four races after he held off his teammate to take victory at Spa.
Having started sixth on the grid, Russell claimed his second win of the season in Belgium from Lewis Hamilton and McLaren’s Oscar Piastri – who was closing with great speed in the dying laps.
In the last race before the summer break Max Verstappen finished fourth having started the race in 11th after making changes to his car.
Russell said: “It was an amazing result, we didn’t predict this.
“A one-two for the team is an awesome result going into the break. It was a team effort. We rolled the dice but it was only possible because the car felt ace.”
Hamilton added: “We didn’t expect this [result]. We had such a disaster on Friday so we made some changes. The car was fantastic today.
“I was trying to get closer but Geroge did a great job with the tyres.
“If we can continue these performances that would be fantastic.”
Piastri said: “I thought I could [catch the Mercedes]. I am happy with the result and we managed the race well.
“I don’t think we could have done too much more. We didn’t have quite enough speed but the pace for George was the right thing to do. We didn’t have the pace to mow him down.!
Some suggest this could be the final F1 race in which we see Sergio Perez in a Red Bull after the Mexican failed to capitalise on his front row start, adding to his season long woes.
F1 Driver Standings
PositionDriverTeamWinsPoints1Max VerstappenRed Bull72752Lando NorrisMcLaren11973Charles LeclercFerrari11744Oscar PiastriMcLaren11645Carlos Sainz JnrFerrari11606Lewis HamiltonMercedes11437George RussellMercedes21418Sergio PerezRed Bull01289Fernando AlonsoAston Martin04710Lance StrollAston Martin02411Nico HulkenbergHaas02212Yuki TsunodaRB02213Daniel RicciardoRB01114Oliver BearmanFerrari0615Pierre GaslyAlpine0616Kevin MagnussenHaas0517Alexander AlbonWilliams0418Esteban OconAlpine0419Zhou GuanyuSauber0020Logan SargeantWilliams0021Valtteri BottasSauber00F1 Driver Standings